The Girl Everybody Forgot
by Raekitty13
Summary: “It’s the only truth I know, sir. “That it is.” There was an odd glint in his eyes. “Make sure when you find that magic key and unlock your past, to come back here and share it with me, there is something special about you, Cali.” OliverWoodxCaliKatzOC
1. Haunting Nightmares

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Harry Potter. My name is not Jo Rowling… although I wouldn't mind it if you sent her fan mail to me!

**Author's Notes: **This story is somewhat of an alternate universe considering it could have happened, but it might have changed too many things that JK Rowling has already written. I have been pondering how to write a story like this for a while. Here's how it came out. Hope you enjoy!

**Chapter one- Haunting Nightmares**

"Lori! I told you to stay in the closet! You mustn't come out! You hear me!"

I looked at the woman before me. Her red hair was flying everywhere in her panic. Her green eyes blazing with fear and anxiety.

"You can't come out, no matter what, you hear! Got that? Answer me, Lori!"

I looked at the woman. I was scared now. "Yes, Mummy." I answered.

She pushed me back into the closet and shut the door. It was dark inside; I began squirming as I heard footsteps climbing the stairs. There was a hand on the door handle as it began to turn.

Something wasn't right tonight. Mummy was worried and the air was thick with fear and panic. It was almost suffocating, like the dark surrounding me. It was just waiting for me to let my guard down.

The door opened and I saw black cloak swish into view along with matching chucks.

"Daddy!" I flung myself out of the closet, attaching myself to his left leg.

Daddy would protect me from the monstrous dark in the closet. He wouldn't let anything harm me!

"What the hell are you wearing, James?" Mummy asked glancing at his shoes.

"Chucks, they match my hair!"

"You, Dork!" Mummy replied halfheartedly.

"Lori!" Daddy said looking down at his feet, finally noticing that I was attached. "What are you doing out here?"

"Daddy, why do I have to go into the closet? It's scary in there!"

Daddy and Mummy exchanged glances and then Daddy kneeled down to my height. It took me that long to realize how short I was.

He took my shoulders in his big hands and said, "Lori, we're going to play a game of hide and seek. Where do you think a good place to hide would be?"

I looked at him. His wild, jet-black hair was sticking up everywhere and his brown eyes look scared behind his glasses. I couldn't think of anything so scary about playing hide and seek.

"But, Daddy, the closet?" I asked.

"Please, Lori?"

"Who are we hiding from?"

Daddy didn't answer. "You know the rules, right?" he asked after a short pause.

"I can't make any noises. I have to sit still."

"And the most important one?" Mummy asked holding my baby brother in her arms.

"I can't come out, no matter what."

"Good girl." Daddy said and he kissed me on the top of my head. "I love you, Lori."

Mummy did the same and once again I found myself inside of the closet. It was muggy and hot. I stumbled on the spare shoes as I fought my way back to my special corner.

"Do you think he will come tonight?" I heard my Mum ask.

"Yes, I was for warned by Dumbledore. We should be on the look out."

"James, she doesn't know. She won't understand." Mummy began to cry.

"Lily," Daddy was cradling her in his arms. I didn't understand what she was saying, that much was for sure.

"James, what if we don't make it? What if Lori and Harry don't make it?"

"Shhh." He cooed. "We're gonna make it, Love. I promise. And if we don't, Lori and Harry will be all right."

"James, nobody else knows about Lori. They all think Harry is our first born." Mummy whispered.

What was that supposed to mean?

"She'll be fine. You'll see. We're all going to walk away from this. I mean you have me to protect you all!" Daddy ran his hand through his hair.

Mummy laughed and said, "You still try too hard to impress me, James."

He leaned in and kissed her. "That's because I love you."

Suddenly there was a loud bang and Daddy bolted down the stairs. I panicked. I began to cry out.

Mummy opened the closet and pointed her wand at me. "I'm sorry baby, but it's for your own good. I love you, dear."

"Mummy," I cried reaching out for her.

"Silencio." She murmured twice, once pointing her wand at me and then at baby Harry.

I was still crying but no sound of it came to my ears. Mummy was still crying as well. "Be strong, Lori. You can do this. You're father and I love you dearly."

Suddenly I heard a lot of crashing coming from down stairs. My panic increased. What was Daddy doing down there?

I began to move from the closet again. Mummy saw me and muttered something else.

I was frozen in place. I couldn't move, I couldn't scream and I couldn't breathe, the dark was beginning to suffocate me again. Panic was rising in my veins as I heard Daddy shout down stairs.

Mummy screamed out to him, her heart literally breaking right then and there. Suddenly a light flashed in the keyhole and a man's voice full of dreadful pleasure shouted, "Alohomora!"

I saw a slight change in Mummy. She straightened her back and stood in the middle of the room, Harry clutched in her arms. Her body was facing away from the door, but her face stared out at the man.

"Have mercy! What kind of man kills a one year old?" Mummy asked.

"Me." Replied the man. His voice was haunting and bone chilling. If I had been able to scream it would have died in my throat anyway.

"Have Mercy!" Mummy said again, her voice raising with fear and anger. "He is only a baby!"

"Move out of my way and you shall be spared." He sneered. "This never would have happened if you would have simply joined me."

"I would never join you. Nor shall I move." Mummy spat at his feet and sent a bolt of light from her piece of wood toward him.

"Foolish." He said. He pointed a similar piece of wood at Mummy and sent hers from her hand with out a word. "I'll give you one last chance as was Snape's wish. Join me. Move aside to allow me to kill him."

"Never!" Mummy shouted. "Harry! Harry I love you! Have MERCY! What did we do to you?"

"You defied me. You and that stupid moron of a husband you had."

"Have." Mummy corrected.

"Had. You foolish woman. Do you really think your beloved James Potter could defeat me?" Again his cruel smile was back. "Poor Snape."

"HARRY!"

"Avada Kedavra!" All I saw was a green flash as Mummy fell. I wanted to scream I wanted her to get up off the floor. I wanted her to do something, let me know she was just kidding. This was all still a simple game of hide and seek. 

My screams went unheard, even to myself, as the man in the room advanced on Baby Harry. His wand pointed at his forehead and again I heard him shout the words with a twisted joy, "Avada Kedavra!"

Suddenly everything went black. My screams were no longer silent but ringing in my ears.

"Mummy get up and help Harry! Mummy get UP! MUMMY!" I shouted over and over again.

I heard someone say something, but I didn't understand them. My blood had run cold. Both my parents and baby Harry had died. What had I done, just standing there? Watching it all unfold.

Suddenly cold hands clamped over my mouth, forcing my eyes open. All I could see was the surrounding darkness. Its suffocating fingers were now wrapping their fingers around me. Finally doing what it had wanted to do all along.

"Cali! Oh, come on Cali!" The fingers moved from suffocating me to holding me. "It was only a dream!"

Again I opened my eyes and through the pale light streaming in through the window all of my surroundings became apparent. I was sitting up in my bed, seven others surrounding me.

All of the girls in my dorm had been waken up by my night terrors, each one sitting up and looking at me with worry. We were all orphans, we where all we had.

My surroundings continued to wake me up to reality. I had no parents. I had no brother. I had no family. I had no name.

"Cali?" One of the girls asked. "Are you OK?"

"I… I," I couldn't answer Jen.

Was I okay? Or was I totally insane?

"What was your dream about, Cali?" the girl beside me asked.

I looked into Haley's face, intending to tell her everything. Ever since I arrived here she had been my best friend. But suddenly I felt the very tentacles of darkness absorbing my dream; bit by bit it became blurry and unclear.

All that I could remember was the fear. It was still chilling my blood I wanted to hurl.

I turned my head away from the girls and threw up. My little supper retching up my sore throat. I gave another dry heave and then turned back to them while wiping my chin with the back of my hand.

My voice was sore from screaming and then vomiting, but I had to tell them. I owed them that much considering I had woken them all up, again.

"I don't remember. It was so clear moments ago." My voice was quiet and raspy. "There were these two adults…"

"You're parents! Cali you were dreaming of your parents!" Alley whispered excitedly.

I had come into this orphanage oddly and all the girls wanted to know where I had come from, who my parents were, why I was here. And I couldn't tell them a single thing about my past.

The last thing I could remember was the day I came here. I was three, sitting outside in the forest when a ginger cat came up to me. He let me pet him and play with him. Then suddenly he disappeared. He came back again and I swore I heard him whisper, "_Safety is this way." _

I had followed him. Asking him questions only to have them answered in the same manor. He had led me here. Where the mistress took me in out of the kindness of her heart, calling me Cali because I was talking to the Orphanage cat, Rascal, a pretty calico, when she found me.

All of the girls had adopted me at once, amused about what I told them about Rascal. How he liked to hide when adults came in to adopt one of us. And how he liked table scraps. Or being scratched behind the ears.

"I'm not sure." I said. "I can't remember the dream all that well."

"What did these adults look like?" Yasmine asked.

I closed my eyes and tried to visualize them there before me. But no matter how hard I tried they always slipped past my mental, grasping fingers. They were only blurry reflections in a puddle. I would never see them clearly unless I was dreaming.

I simply shook my head. "I don't know. I can't remember… anything."

I knew they were disappointed with me. I couldn't remember anything about who I was before I came here. I was simply the girl who could talk to cats. I was mysterious and these girls wanted to help me solve my mystery, but I wasn't helping them any.

"I'm sorry." I said quietly, hanging my head.

"Don't be." Jasmine, Yasmine's twin replied.

I tried to smile at them but only managed to grimace.

"Come on, you need to change nightgowns." Haley said pulling me from my bed.

I realized why I was so cold; I was covered in sticky, cold sweat. Again fear raised in my belly and spilled out through my mouth.

Haley helped me to change clothes after I finished vomiting for the second time.

"Don't worry, Cali. It was only a dream."

But was it?

**Author's Notes:** OK that was the first chapter. What do you guys think? It's not really a cliffy… it just ends with a rhetorical question used to make you think and keep you interested in the story. Please Review! I'd really appreciate it!


	2. What the Frogs!

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer: **Sigh… We've been through this before! I AM NOT J.K. ROWLING!

**Author's Notes: **I must thank Luna32, Gwen Gamgee and SkittleFREAK for reading my story. You guys are the best and I'm glad you liked it. You guys ROCK! The **BOLD** lettering besides the titles are said in "Cat Speak" or meows.

**Chapter Two- What the… Frogs?!**

The rest of the night all I was able to do was toss and turn. Sleep never came. At least it never came for me. All the other girls in my dorm fell asleep shortly after my night terror.

I was left all alone to defend myself from the dark. It was really creepy. I kept feeling it's dark fingers reaching out for me. I fell into a fitful sleep. This was a normal routine.

Over the next couple of days I began to get less and less sleep. I would wake up every night with only the atmosphere of something dark and dangerous clinging to me. The girls were really beginning to get scared.

"Cali," Yasmine said on the fourth night. "We need to do something to help you. I can't stand this any longer."

Jasmine, Alley, and Haley all nodded in agreement.

"What can you do to help bring back my memory that the Orphan Mistress hasn't tried?" I asked.

"I'm not sure." Yasmine admitted. "But something has to be done. Or else you past is going to eat you alive!"

I nodded. "All of the psychologists so far have said I've been through a major trauma."

"What was the reason they said they couldn't find your parents?" Kelsey asked.

Kelsey was the newest to our room. She had just been added two nights ago. She was the only one of us not accustom to my night terrors. She also hadn't heard the whole story. All of the other girls had been here when I arrived. Not Kelsey.

"They simply couldn't find them. No one would claim me. After a while they finally assumed that my parents had died, and I had witnessed it. The cause for my amnesia. I had been so traumatized by the brutal death of my parents that I had no memories of my life."

"The weird part was that nobody had died in the area around our orphanage. At least no where near enough for a three year old to walk." Haley had taken over my story telling for me. "So they think she could have been left behind by her parents."

"But that doesn't explain why she would have lost her memory!" Kelsey argued.

I nodded. "Exactly. But I have no clue what happened to me. I have nightmares every now and then. I think they're memories. But the more I try to remember the more I seem to forget. The more I concentrate, the more the memories slip between my fingers."

"I'm sorry." Kelsey said.

"What about you?" Jasmine asked warily. "Why are you here?"

"My parents were arrested for bank robbery." She said with a wiry smile.

"Why are you smiling?" Alley asked.

"Because, my parents weren't the bank robbers. They were the ones trying to stop the bank robbers. But nobody would believe them." Kelsey replied.

"Why not?" I asked.

There was an odd glint in Kelsey's eyes. "I can't tell you, or else someone might come after you."

"You mean your parents work for the Ministry and got arrested?" Yasmine asked.

Kelsey stared at Yasmine for a while. Suddenly she burst, "How did you know?"

I didn't believe her for an instant. She answered way too late, plus, her facial expression wasn't that of surprise. It was more like she was laughing at Yasmine's idea. I kind of felt insulted, but didn't say anything. Some people have to lie to hide pain.

"I have an idea to help you." Haley said.

"What," I asked, hoping it involved some sort of sleeping pills.

"Think of something happy before you go to sleep." She said.

I felt disappointed, but I didn't want her to know that. "I'll give it a try, Hay."

She smiled. "Great."

"Cali! You're little friends are back!" Called the Orphanage Mistress.

"Coming, Ma'am." I called to her, to the girls I said; "Maybe it's Blaze!"

"Yay!" Everyone but Kelsey cheered.

"Do you think you could get more from him about your past?" Jasmine asked excitedly.

"I'm confused." Kelsey stated. "Who's Blaze?"

"Blaze is one of Cali's cat friends…"

I left while Haley began to explain to Kelsey how I could speak to cats. Like Jasmine suggested, what if Blaze would tell me more about my past? In either case it would be worth my while to tell him about my night terrors. He always seemed to like hearing about them.

Opening the back door I saw a large, orange cat sitting on the last porch step. He was cleaning his fur, waiting for me to bring him a treat.

Pulling out a piece of bacon from breakfast, I threw my arms around him, "Blaze!"

"**Hello, Cali." **He purred.

"**I haven't seen you for so long!"** I replied, speaking in meows.

"**It's been a while, that's for sure." **He replied head butting my chin lovingly. **"Do you know why I am here today, Cali?"**

I thought about it for a while. Today was August twelfth. As far as I could remember nothing special was today. **"No."**

"**Tomorrow is a special day, Cali."**

"How so?" 

"**Tomorrow is your eleventh birthday." **He replied.

"**Really?"** I asked excited. **"How do you know my birthday is August thirteenth?"**

"**I remembered the other day that when I first led you hear, you told me that all you knew was that your birthday was August the thirteenth."**

"**Did I say anything else, Blaze?"** I asked.

"**Nothing of importance. For the most part you were sobbing."**

"**Oh,"** I said sadly.

"**Don't be sad." **He meowed softly. **"Your memories will return to you in time."**

He rubbed up against my leg.

"Blaze, why did you tell me about this just now?" 

"**What? About your birthday?"**

"**Yes."**

"**I just remembered." **When he noticed that I didn't believe him he added mysteriously, **"Something should come in the post for you tomorrow, Cali."**

"**Say what?"** I demanded a little confused.

**"Something important should come in the po-"**

Suddenly Blaze bristled.

"What is it?" I asked, switching back to English.

"I'm what most call Animal Control." Replied a young man with terrible scratches up and down his arm as he threw a net over Blaze. "I'm glad you were able to keep him sitting for so long. Normally he always slips through my fingers."

"Blaze!" I said. "You can't take him. He's my cat."

"This is an orphanage, you're not allowed to have pets." He replied with a horrid smile. "It's against health codes. Nice try, thought."

"No! He's mine!" I cried. "You can't take him."

"Watch me." He replied.

I closed my eyes and screamed at the top of my lungs. Then I felt something fall onto my head.

Looking up I saw another something falling towards me. I screamed again.

That's when I noticed that the things falling weren't falling, and that they were frogs. They had leapt out of the weeds behind me and were now charging the Animal Control Man.

I screamed again, "You can't take him!"

The frogs continued to charge the man. He looked really scared at first because his back was turned from me and the oddly acting frogs. He literaly had no clue what had hit him, and what was _still_ hitting him.

Turning around his eyes widened even larger. "What the… _FROGS_?! Ahhhhh!"

I must have looked dumb founded.

"How did you know I was afraid of _FROGS_?" He demanded. "Ahhh! For this I'll make sure to put this creature to sleep as soon as- AHHH!"

I tried to kick the man, but he ran away from me and the crazed frogs. He reached the van before me.

"**Cali, if you want answers, you have to take the important information coming for you thorugh the post tomorrow, seriously." **Blaze said.

I didn't get to ask him what he meant nor say good bye. The mad man afraid of the frogs drove off at a neck breaking speed. Away from me, taking my only link to my past.

"**BLAZE!" **I howled.

Of course there was no answer.

**Author's Notes: **I'm sorry it has taken me so long to update, I have lots of stories and A LOT of homework. Please don't get mad at me for not updating as soon as you would like. Although, if I knew more people liked this story, I might update it more often… I'll leave that up to you of how you get your point across though.


	3. The Oh So Very Important Post

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer: **I am the one and only Fan Fiction Author, Raekitty13. Please, no flattery, I assure you, I am not J. K. Rowling using a random pen name. Believe me, have you not read my fan fics?

**Author's Notes: **Hey guys. I think I'm really starting to bond with this story. It had a really slow start but I think it's getting better. I can't wait until later, when we can get the romance started! I mean, who doesn't love fluff? Anyway, story notes of importance:

**Again, bold lettering, if not an author's note, is "Cat Speak".**

_Thank Yous: Audra Kaiba, and Luna32. Thank you ever so much guys! You're the best of the best!_

**Chapter Three- The Oh-So-Very Important Post**

"I don't believe this." I said looking at the owl beside me. Tied to its leg was a letter, one that had the name Cali on it. It read, 'Miss Cali. Room 13 in the Pine Forest Orphanage.'

The writing was in green ink. It looked so fancy, so professional yet so surreal. Just reaching for the letter made me feel weird.

"This is a really cruel joke." I muttered. The information on the front was so strangely correct that it was creepy.

"What?" Alley looked really confused.

"Guys, there's something I have to tell you." I said.

All eight of the girls sat down around my feet. I sat down with them.

"Yesterday, I was talking to Blaze-"

"It _was_ Blaze!" Jasmine interrupted happily.

"Yes…" I had stayed outside long after Blaze was taken. I had cried my eyes out. To me he was the last bit of my family that I had left, my old family, the one I longed to be reconnected with.

When I had come back in I hadn't said a word. I was silent and didn't eat my dinner. Yet no one seemed to notice. No one but Kelsey, but she said nothing, just watched me.

Last night I tried to think of happy thoughts. I made myself dream of my family sending me a letter. In it, they explained how my baby brother, mother and father had left me. How they were still alive and wanted me to come home now.

But like always the dream shifted. I was left in the clutches of the dark all over again. I managed to lose all memories again and again and again.

But they had a right to know. And they had to know before I opened the hoax letter.

"It was Blaze."

"Did he tell you something of importance?" Jen asked.

"Yeah." I said untying the letter from the Owl's leg. Surprisingly it didn't bite me like I had been expecting.

The owl had just shown up at the window around eight-o'clock, the time all of the girls in the dorm are awake by. It was scratching at the window and at first I didn't know what it was. Surprise! It was an owl carrying something tied to its leg. A phony, big joke kind of letter. My question was how the person pulling the prank managed to tame the owl…

"Well, what did he tell you?" Jasmine demanded.

"Something about your parents?" Haley asked hopefully.

"No." I replied. "He told me my birthday. Today is my birthday, and I'm eleven years old today."

"Wow! Lucky!" Yasmine said. "You know you're birthday!"

"Maybe that's from your parents!" Alley shouted happily.

"Maybe." I said, refusing to get my hopes up. "But Blaze also said something else."

"He did?"

"What?"

Yasmine and Jasmine asked at the same time. I smiled despite myself. Their excitement was catching!

"He said that if I wanted answers to my questions, I had to take an important letter coming to me in the post."

"He said something important was coming to you in the post today?" Alley asked.

"Yeah." I said. Holding up the letter I added, "And then today I wake up to this owl outside our window, this letter tied to its leg."

The girls just stared at me.

"You're a witch." Kelsey said quietly.

"Say what?" I asked taken a back. Did she just call me a witch?

"You can perform magic. I saw you yesterday. After that man took Blaze, you sent frogs after him. You can do magic, you witch." Kelsey accused.

I just stared at her. "Y-you're insane."

"No I'm not. You can talk to cats and control frogs. You're a witch."

"I am not!" I said.

"Then open the letter and read it to us." She taunted.

"But it's my letter."

"Does it not contain information important to everybody else here. Don't you owe your past to everyone here?"

I nodded looking down at the letter. On the back it had an odd seal on it. There was a coat of arms divided into four pieces. On the upper left hand corner was a picture of a golden lion on a red background. On the lower left hand side was a badger on a yellow backdrop. Across from that was a raven on a blue as dark as the evening sky. Above the raven and across from the lion was a snake curled up on a dark green background. In the center of the crest was a capital H. Just above the coat of arms was one odd word, Hogwarts.

Opening the letter I was afraid of what I would see. I did owe this to the girls. I did want the answers to my questions and I was NOT a witch.

Looking at the letter I gulped. The letter was written on the same heavy parchment and in the same curly green ink. _Well, here goes_:

"Dear Miss Cali, Speaker of the Cats: we are pleased to inform you that you haven been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment."

"I told you! She's a witch!" Kelsey shouted.

For some reason she seemed delighted rather than scared.

"There's more! There has to be!" Yasmine said.

Jasmine nodded. "There's another piece of parchment."

"Shhh! Let her continue! I think there's more on the paper she's looking at." Haley said.

I nodded and continued. "Term begins on September first. We await your owl by no later than August fourteenth. Yours sincerely, Minerva McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress."

"What are you waiting for?" Jen said. "Blaze said if you want answers then you need to take the post seriously today!"

"Yeah, but this? This is crazy!" I said.

At that the owl that still hadn't left bit my finger.

"What are you waiting for Cat Speaker?" It asked speaking, to my surprise, in Cat Speak. 

"**I didn't realize owls could speak Cat!" **I replied.

"Don't be surprised. I am an Owl Post owl, I'm very intelligent and fluent in many animal languages."

"**What? Why? How?"**

"**Do not insult my intelligence by asking how." **The owl snapped. **"Why, because how else would I be able to find my way around so well?"**

"**I'm sorry."** I replied.

"Um, Cali… Are you talking to the owl now, too?" Alley demanded.

"…Yeah…" I replied sheepishly.

"**What are you waiting for? Hurry up and answer. I don't have much time to get back!" **The owl responded.

"I don't know…"

There were plenty of objections to that both in English and Cat Speak. All at the same time too. I was kind of out numbered. But I still didn't know… how was I supposed to get these supplies by September First? I didn't have money and I had no clue where to get these things. Plus, how was I to get there?

"**Simply put all of your questions on paper when you reply." **The owl remarked as if reading my thoughts.

"What about the orphanage mistress?" I asked no one in particular.

"Don't tell her about it yet." Jen suggested.

"Let the Deputy Headmistress deal with it." Jasmine said.

"**Make sure to mention it in your letter."** The owl said.

I nodded. Blaze wanted me to figure out my past. This was the only lead I had. My parents might have been magical beings too! Maybe this wasn't such a bad idea. I was beginning to wish it wasn't a joke. If it was it was pretty cruel at this rate.

"Girls! Breakfast!" Called the cafeteria lady.

Everybody but me left. I was going to write my letter. I was going to take this seriously like Blaze wanted. I was going to learn of my past while paving my future at the same time.

**Author's Notes: **The end of Chapter Three and now on to Chapter Four… are you excited? Are you bored? What does my story need? Have any ideas of what's going to happen next? What ever it is you have to say, I wanna hear it! So please review!!!


	4. Shopping Spree

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer: **Lalalalalalalalala… oh. Am I supposed to put something important here?

**Author's Notes:** I have a couple of comments to make here for KRP's benefit. While the owl in the last chapter was indeed very intelligent, the first couple of lines were in bold on my computer, but when it was transferred to it changed it and I didn't catch it. A couple of Blaze's lines were that way too. I'm sorry for that. Don't you just love techology? lol. I can tell you that Cali is two years older than Harry but you'll have to learn the past at the same time as Cali for the rest of your questions to be answered. And lastly… I don't know how an owl makes meowing noises… it's a fan fic… right? Plus it's also somewhat of a AU… so… lol. I hope the rest of you enjoy the chapter!!! I'm having fun writing this story. As I said before it's really starting to grow on me!

**Other notes of importance:**

---: Indicates passing time.

**Bold lettering is Cat Speak if not an Author's Note or title.**

_Thank yous: Luna32 and KRP. I'm so glad you all took the time to review! I really enjoyed reading what you had to say. I hope you have fun comparing your predictions to my latest chapter!!! Thank you ever so much guys!!!_

**Chapter Four- Shopping Spree**

"**Wow. You're a quick little owl." **I remarked as the owl that had delivered my letter earlier returned.

"**Not that fast. It's ten thirty PM."**

"**You still got it here in the same day, right?"**

If owls could smile, that's what I would call this owl's facial expression.

"**Open your letter, Cat Speaker. You've waited long enough for answers." **The owl gave another one of its "smiles". **"See you around, Cat Speaker."**

I nodded. Taking the letter and reopening the window for the owl. I let the cool breeze of the on coming fall brush my long red hair across my face before closing it again.

Opening the envelope I glanced at it nervously. What was I going to see? Was this really all just a joke?

Looking at the parchment it had the same color and handwriting. I read it silently by the light of the full moon:

Dear Cali Cat Speaker,

We understand that you are an Orphan. We have a financial program for the poor, Orphans and Muggles. As for transportation and your Orphanage Mistress that is all planed out. On August 31st Miss Kelsey Brawning's aunt, Mrs. Fewer, will take you shopping and then pick you up again on September 1st to take you King's Crossing where you will board the Hogwarts Express from Platform 9 ¾. While Mrs. Fewer is there she will explain both you and Kelsey's absence. You have nothing to worry about. I hope you will enjoy your first year at Hogwarts. If you have any other questions, feel free to ask.

Yours sincerely,

_Minerva McGonagall_

Minerva McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress

I felt so excited as I went to bed that night. I had happy thoughts on the brain. I was going to a new school, one for Witches and Wizards. I was going to get answers, ones that I could share with everybody else.

The excitement had clouded my mind. I wasn't thinking of the impending darkness. I wasn't thinking about Blaze being taken away. I wasn't even curious about how Professor McGonagall knew I was a Witch, or if Kelsey Brawning was the same Kelsey that was here in my Orphanage. If she was happy that I was a witch because she too, was a witch.

That was the first night I had gotten any real sleep for nine years. Although I didn't have any scary dreams, I did dream about my family again. This time it was different from all of the other times.

"_Daddy. What is that word?" I asked pointing to the newspaper in front of us._

_We were sitting at the kitchen table, me in his lap, coffee in his hand. He was reading the newspaper and I was trying to find words I recognized. So far I had found three._

"_Well," Daddy said following my finger. "What letter does it start with?"_

"_A t?" I asked._

"_Yes, that's a t." He praised. "What's the next letter?"_

"_An h?"_

"_Yes. Good job!"_

"_The next one is an… e… right, Daddy?"_

"_Yes. Now sound it out."_

"_T…h…e…" I stumbled with the pronunciation a bit. "The?"_

"_The! Very good, Lori!" Daddy said happily. "Lily, your daughter is a genius just like you."_

"_What was that, James?" Mummy called from the kitchen._

"_I said your daughter is as smart as you." Daddy had a proud expression on his face._

_Mummy came out to the table and kissed my forehead. "Looks like Lori takes after me, meaning Harry's going to be a __Quidditch _ _star like you."_

"_Quidditch?" I asked._

"_Best not to get your father started, Sweety." Mummy said lifting me off of Daddy's lap. "Want to help me with the toast, Lori?"_

"_Yeah!" _

_---------------_

Over the remaining days until August thirty-first I was so excited. I couldn't wait to go shopping. I was no longer worried about if this was some sort of joke, but whether or not I was going to understand anything they tried to teach me. So really I was nervously excited…

"Kelsey," I asked one day. I was tired of waiting for her aunt. I wanted to ask her. "Have you been to Hogwarts before?"

"No." Kelsey said with a smile. "This is my first year as well, but I'm not a Muggle-born either."

"A Muggle-born?" I asked rather confused.

"A Muggle is a person who is non-magical. There for a Muggle-Born is a Witch or Wizard born to non-magical parents." She explained.

"I don't think that's the case for me." I said. "Blaze said to find answers I needed to take the letter seriously, I needed to go to Hogwarts. That means at least one of my parents had to be Witch or Wizard, right?"

Kelsey nodded, "Either that or they were related to a Witch or Wizard."

"The other girls," I started.

"If you feel your past is really as much theirs as it is yours, you can tell them, I guess. But I don't think they'll believe you. Plus, I have no clue what story my aunt is going to feed the Orphanage Mistress."

"If you have an aunt, why do you live here?" I asked. "Why don't you live with her?"

"My aunt doesn't live the life of a caring guardian. She's training to become a travel agent, and so she needs to travel a lot. But when my parents got arrested for been present at the crime scene, she agreed to take me shopping. But Dumbledore must have known you were going to be attending as well."

"Dumbledore?"

"Actually it's Professor Dumbledore, he's the Headmaster."

"Oh! I see. When did you get your letter."

"On my birthday, May 17th." Kelsey said with a smile. "Make sure to mark it because you and I are going to stick together."

I nodded. "You can count on it. I have no clue what it is I'm getting into."

"Me neither for the most part." Kelsey admitted. "It's not like I have any older siblings."

"But your parents?"

"They're American." Kelsey replied.

"Oh…" I smiled. "It's still better to get lost with someone else than to get lost all on your own!"

"True." She agreed with a smile.

_---------------_

"Do you girls have your lists?" Mrs. Fewer asked.

She was a lot younger than I thought she would be. "We're newly weds. I told Ted to wait until after I'm done with my training, but he said that he wanted to be with me forever, starting now." She had such a lovely smile whenever she talked about Ted. They must really love each other, that's the only thought that entered my head whenever she talked about him.

"Yeah." We replied together.

We were so excited. It was great, tomorrow we would be on our way to Hogwarts. Tomorrow we would start the rest of our lives. Tomorrow it wouldn't matter for me that I was an orphan, for her it wouldn't matter that her parents were arrested for something they didn't do, we had the chance to start over and we were going to take it. We couldn't wait.

"You want to read it to me? That way I can think of all the stores we need to enter before we go into all the others?" she smiled brightly.

"Okay." Kelsey said. "For our uniforms we need three sets of plain black work robes, one plain, black pointed hat for day wear, one pair of protective gloves of dragon hide or similar, and one black winter cloak with silver fastenings."

"Okay," Mrs. Fewer said. "We'll have to stop at Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. What's next on your list?"

"Next is the book list!" I replied excitedly. We were sitting on the subway on our way to Diagon Alley. I was excited, my first Wizarding community, what clues would I find there?

"We need The Standard Book of Spells Grade One, By Miranda Goshawk."

"Got two of them." Kelsey said grabbing two books off the shelf. We had gotten our uniform stuff taken care of. "Next?"

We were in Flourish and Blot's bookstore. "A History of Magic, by Bathilda Bagshot."

"Got them here." Replied the store clerk.

"Next?" Mrs. Fewer asked.

" Magical Theory, by Adalbert Waffling." I said looking up, "Oh, here they are."

I pulled two books off the shelf and added them to our pile. "Next is A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration, by Emeric Switch."

"Okay," Kelsey said. "The next one is One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi, by Phyllisa Spore, right?"

"Yeah. And then we need Magical Drafts and Potions, by Arsenius Jigger."

"Is that it?" Kelsey asked.

"Nope. We still need Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, by Newt Scamander and-"

"The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection."

I whirled around to find a guy with sandy brown hair and intense blue eyes standing behind me. When I turned around he ran his hand through his hair nervously reminding me of someone…

"How'd you know that?" I asked.

He smiled. "I'm in my Second year at Hogwarts. I think I still have a good copy of that one if you want to save your galleons."

"Gallons?" I asked.

"Um, yeah. You know the money you're paying with. Those are Knuts, Sickles, and Galleons." He pulled out three coins as he said there names he showed me the different ones. The Knut was a bronze color, the Sickle a silver and the Galleon was gold-ish. "There's seventeen Sickles to a Galleon and twenty-nine Knuts to a Sickle."

"So there's four hundred and ninety-three Knuts to a Galleon?" I asked.

He took a couple of minutes, "Yeah, that's right. That was a pretty quick calculation."

I smiled but he seemed a little discouraged. "What's wrong?"

"Huh?" he asked looking up at me again suddenly. "Oh, I was just thinking about how you were most likely going to end up in Ravenclaw."

"Is that bad?" I asked.

"Uh," I watched him blush and felt my cheeks warm at the thought of _why_ he was blushing… "No. It's just that my house is Gryffindor."

"House?" I asked.

"Um… Mr.…." Mrs. Fewer stumbled and I realized we hadn't swapped names yet.

"Wood. I'm Oliver Wood." He said suddenly offering me his hand.

I took it but what was I supposed to say? What was my name again?

"Right, we'll leave you here to explain to Cali a little more in depth about Hogwarts." Mrs. Fewer saved me.

"Uh, okay." He said awkwardly. I really couldn't blame him…

"Cali, we'll get the rest of your stuff on the supply list but your wand." I nodded and she turned to Oliver. "Can I trust you to bring her to Ollivander's in an hour?"

"She'll be there." Oliver say blushing.

Kelsey pulled me away from Oliver as she took my list and whispered, "My aunt just set you up on a date with that guy. Have fun lucky duck."

Kelsey winked at me as she and her aunt left. I felt so confused. What the heck was I to do on my "date"? What if I messed this up?

I mean Oliver was _really _good looking and he was really nice as far as I knew. But I had known him for a total of what? Seven minutes? And what was I supposed to do if he was a murderer or something?

I turned back towards Oliver smiling nervously, trying to convince my imagination to settle down…

Oliver returned my quivering smile. "So do you want to continue this conversation over an ice-cream Sunday, Cali?"

A true smile touched my lips. "I'd like that very much, Oliver."

He took my arm gently and led me to the ice cream shop down the street. I liked the way he said my name… my hand in his felt safe… his shy smile was really cute… his blue eyes were so intelligent and kind … Oliver. But we weren't even friends yet, right?

**Author's Notes: **Yay fluff! I love fluff! But the fluff is just beginning, plus he's twelve and she's eleven, not much fluff for pre-teens… sighs… we'll all just have to wait… Okay so what do you think? What are your predictions? What do you like, dislike or think should be added? Please review!!! I love your opinions!


	5. Ollivander's

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer: **I don't have a British Accent- unless I feel like seeing how many odd looks I can get in geometry

**Author's Notes:** Thank you KRP, I made a bit of a mistake. You didn't screw up. I'm sorry, but this is taking on the spin of a full fledged AU, I'm going to change Oliver Wood's birthday, he's now only three years older than Harry, and one year older than Cali. I'm sorry, math isn't my strong point and I get confused enough with out made up characters and real ones. Is everybody okay with the change of Oliver's birthday? I hope so. Sorry to disappoint you, but yes… you will have to wait!!! Everybody else, please enjoy!!! Btw, I love reviews!!! (Even if you're shouting at me, lol)

**Other notes of importance:**

---: Indicates passing time.

**Bold lettering is Cat Speak if not an Author's Note or title.**

_Thank yous: _**KRP**_- I'm really glad you reviewed again!!! Thank you ever so much!!! I truly enjoy your reviews!!! They are ever so helpful! _**Luna32**_- KRP says you shout too much in your reviews. lol Thank you for your review. _**Hermonine**- _Thank you ever so much for your review! _**All of you:**_ You are all the best, thank you ever so much!!!_

**Chapter Five- Ollivander's**

"I want to hear this!" Kelsey demanded. "What happened?"

"Not much." I said feeling my cheeks grow red.

"Of course not, dear." Mrs. Fewer said smiling at my blush.

"Story time!" Kelsey shouted happily.

"He took me to the ice-cream shop and bought me an ice-cream Sunday." I said. "The end."

"Someone sounds disappointed." I had to smile at Mrs. Fewer's remark. Was I disappointed?

"No, that's not good enough, I want to hear it **_all_**!" Kelsey said.

"I-"

"Word for word."

"Fine." I glared at her.

"Only being a good best friend. You can't keep secrets from me anymore!"

Again I had to smile. She was right, even though when Kelsey had first to the orphanage, she had seemed like the last person to become a close friend, in all of my Hogwarts excitement we had really bonded.

"You have to start from exactly when we left you two at the book store, too." Kelsey added.

"A bit demanding aren't you?" I asked jokingly.

"Not at all." Kelsey replied smiling.

"Okay," I said, again my face flushing slightly. Just thinking of Oliver made me smile, but thinking of our first date… "As soon as you left…

"Oliver asked me to go to the Ice Cream Parlor down the road.

He led me to a shop called Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor. It was a cute little shop with seats outside with umbrellas over the tables and such. It was perfect for a date, but more importantly it was perfect as a place to get to know people better.

_Oliver smiled shyly again and pulled my seat out for me. I giggled and said, "You don't have to be all formal. It's just ice cream."_

"_Right." He said blushing slightly. "So, are you Muggle-born?"_

_"I-I don't know." I replied. "I don't know much about my past. I was hoping that by attending Hogwarts I would find out more about my family."_

_"That sounds reasonable." He said with a faint smile. "What do you know about Hogwarts?"_

_"Not much, and neither does Kelsey, she's American!"_

_"That's what I figured, I mean her accent kind of gave her away. No offense to her or anything."_

_"Why would she find that offensive?" I asked._

_"I'm not sure." He admitted. "But I figured I'd say that to remain on the safe side."_

_I smiled. "Tell me about your family, Oliver. Are you Muggle-born?"_

_"Nope. My mom and dad are both magical. I'm an only child and I don't really have any pets. I have lots of aunts and uncles though. About twenty cousins total on both sides… hmmm what else can I tell you about my family?"_

_"Tell me what your mother and father are like." I said quietly. "I'd like to know what a normal family is like, seeing as how I've never known one."_

_"Well, my mom and dad get up around six o'clock every morning, my dad gets ready for work and my mom makes him-and me- breakfast and I don't know. My mom and dad are so loving: to me, and to each other. It's kind of hard to explain, maybe I can show you sometime if you want to come to my house over the summer or something."_

_"That'd be cool, if the Orphanage Mistress will let me go, that is." I was blushing slightly at the thought of going to his house._

_"So you live in an orphanage?"_

_"Yeah, I was told that I arrived at the Orphanage, talking to a several cats, one was a Calico and the other was a large orange tom. I kept calling the orange one, Blaze. I was only three years old when I showed up and nobody came to clam me as their daughter, so after five years we were all forced to assume my parents had died or really didn't want me."_

_"I'm sorry." He said quietly. "What if they simply left England, thinking you were the one that died?"_

_"I tried to believe that for a really long time. But I've had this nightmare. It's always the same. I- don't ask me to explain them though. I can't remember them at all. All I know when I wake up is that I was dreaming of my Mom and Dad, and that something terrible happened."_

_"Wow. I'm sorry."_

_"Not your fault." I said shivering slightly._

_Oliver smiled slightly. "Flashbacks?"_

_"I wish. I mean- I'd love to remember my past. But all I can remember really when I think of those nightmares is the fear, the stomach churning, heart stopping, head dizzying fear."_

_"I'm sorry." He whispered. "I wish I could help."_

_"You can!" I said suddenly, smiling broadly._

_"I can?" He asked rather confused._

_"Yeah! Blaze told me that in order to discover my past; I need to go to Hogwarts. The key to the mystery is at Hogwarts. You can teach me everything you know about Hogwarts!"_

_"I can't teach you everything I know about Hogwarts now! There isn't enough time."_

_"Oh."_

_"I know, tomorrow on the train you and your friend Kelsey can sit with me and my friends on the Hogwarts Express. We'll all take turns telling you all we know about it."_

_"Really?" I didn't quiet believe him._

_"Yeah, but right now we'd better start heading over to Ollivander's." _And that's it." I finished.

"That's it?" Kelsey demanded. "That's it! No wonder you were disappointed! Didn't you talk about anything on the way to Ollivander's?"

"No." I said with a smile. "AND I'm not disappointed."

"Of course not, Dear." Mrs. Fewer happily replied, a twinkle in her eye. "He invited you to another date."

"Not really a date." I said with a blush.

"No, not at all!" Kelsey remarked sarcastically catching on to what her aunt was hinting.

"How is it a date if his friends are all going to be there an-" I stopped. That was mean. I didn't mean for it to sound mean! I really wanted Kelsey to be there.

"And me? How could it be a date if I was there?" Kelsey demanded. Then she smiled seeing my expression. "You two would need a chaperon, there for you would need me."

I smiled, sticking my tongue out at her. "Ew! What on earth could the two of us be doing that would require a chaperon?"

"That's rather the point, darling." Mrs. Fewer said smiling. "There are plenty of things the two of you could be doing without a chaperon, but as long as you have one, it weeds out the disgusting stuff."

"Great. Kelsey, you're so coming with me. We're going to strictly make new friends and learn about Hogwarts!"

"Right." Kelsey said, I couldn't tell if she was being truthful or sarcastic.

"Girls, we have to be to King's Crossing by eleven o'clock, I suggest we get your wands and then head to the Leaky Cauldron for dinner." Mrs. Fewer interrupted and we entered the shop.

"Hello. You've been standing outside a while." Came a soft voice from the back of the store.

Kelsey and I exchanged looks. "I-I was explaining something."

"Did this something include that good looking young man named, I do believe his name is, Oliver Wood? Correct?" He came out of the back of the shop, his pale sliver eyes shining mischievously.

"You know Oliver?" I asked surprised.

"I do indeed. Little Miss, do you see any other wand shops about?"

"No, sir. But to remember his name, he was in here last year, not this year. It just surprised me, that's all." I replied.

"It surprised you that I could remember his name, dear girl I could tell you every wand I've ever sold and to whom I sold it to." Mr. Ollivander said glaring at me. "Lily Evans used a Ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, willow wand. Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Games at Hogwarts had a rather bendy, sixteen-inch wand. And as for your friend, Oliver Wood, he bought a Cedar, nine and three-quarters inch wand."

"Wow," I muttered making a mental note to ask Oliver who Lily Evans was tomorrow on the train. "That's pretty amazing how you remember all that stuff."

"Amazing? Dear child, this is not amazing, it is simply my life." He said with a wave of his hand.

At his invitation my gaze swept across his shop. It wasn't large but it wasn't small either. It was crammed from floor to ceiling with shelves stocked to the gills of long narrow boxes. The late afternoon sunlight filtering in through the front and only windows displayed wonderfully the dancing particles of dust in the air.

"Wow," I muttered again.

"But on to introductions. I am Mr. Ollivander. Who are you two?" He asked, left hand out for a shake.

"I'm Kelsey Brawning." Kelsey said taking his hand with a smile.

"And I'm Cali." I said shaking his hand. "Cali Katz."

"Something tells me you are not telling me the truth." He said not letting go of my hand, staring into my eyes as if daring me to tell him the truth. If only I could.

"It's the only truth I know, sir." I replied confidently.

"That it is." There was an odd glint in his eyes. "Make sure when you find that magic key and unlock your past, to come back here and share it with me, there is something special about you, Cali."

"Yes, sir." I said wondering what could be so special about me- other than the fact that I can talk to cats. I mean- we never told him that I could speak to cats. So what was he talking about?

"Now, you girls didn't come here to chit-chat. On to the wand selecting." He said beginning to wander around the many dusty shelves. Turning back towards Kelsey and I he added, "Although, it really is the wand that chooses the Wizard, or in this case, the Witch. Miss Brawning, you first."

I watched him pull box after box down from the shelves. It took Mr. Ollivander forever to find a wand for her, or rather her for a wand. None of them seemed to like her. One of them even burnt her. Mr. Ollivander's spirit wasn't to be crushed so easily.

"Kelsey, where did you say you were from?" He asked suddenly placing what must have been the three-hundredth wand box back.

"America." She said nursing her burnt finger. "Why?"

"Why? I was looking in the wrong section! That's why." He said.

"Section? There's organization to this mess?" she demanded warily.

"Mess?" Mr. Ollivander's eyes flashed. "I have half a notion to send you out into the street."

"Mr. Ollivander," I butted in quickly. "You said you were looking in the wrong section- does that mean you have separate sections for different nations?"

"Sort of." He said turning to me. "But not really. Normally the only people to attend Hogwarts are the people who are born in Europe. But sometimes people are destined to come to my shop, it's the wand calling them- and because the wand is calling so hard, I know these Witches or Wizards are coming from a long distance to be united with their destiny. There for I set them aside. Here we go."

While he had been explaining he had disappeared behind many rows of shelves. Now he had reappeared carrying six wand boxes. Some of them looked quite old while others seemed brand new. The box that interested me the most was a black box. It almost seemed to be squirming- it had to be the streetlights playing tricks.

"I can tell you can see the wand's anxiety, too, Cali." Mr. Ollivander said to me approvingly as he took off the lid.

Removing the cleaning cloth he handed the wand to Kelsey handle up. She grasped the wand firmly and a slight breeze blew through the room, blue stars shooting from the end of her wand. Kelsey looked be-dazzled. I looked on in amazement.

"Ah, yes, there is something magical indeed about the union of a Witch and her wand." Mr. Ollivander remarked. "Measure."

I smiled at his play on words. I barely noticed as a yellow measuring tape began to measure my arm length and such as it had earlier for Kelsey.

"You're turn, Cali." He said re-boxing Kelsey's wand. "Wrap!" he said to some paper sitting on the counter and to my amazement, it did just as he said. To Kelsey he said, "That will be seven gallons, Miss Brawning."

"Cali, are you ready?" He asked excitement lighting his other wise cold eyes. "Your future is about to bond with you past. Fate is about to judge you, life as you know it will never be the same."

He held out the first wand for me to take, handle up. My future waiting for me to grasp it firmly in both hands and sweep me off my feet. I reaching out with my left hand, grabbed onto one of the many I was bound to try.

"I'm ready."

**Author's Notes: **I'm so so so so sooo sorry it took so long to update, almost a month! I also apologize for all of the mistakes you must have found! Can you find it in your hearts to forgive me and review? It would be greatly appreciated! As always- predictions, corrections and questions are welcome!


	6. The Hogwarts Express

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Author's Notes:** Yes, I am so sorry for the late update! I had this chapter already written and then I lost it! It's on a floppy somewhere… I gave up on finding it so I just decided to rewrite it. I'm so sorry! Thank yous go to the every wonderful reviewers: Eliabeth, VioletPastTime, and Samalamadingdong.

**Chapter six Hogwarts' Express**

I still couldn't believe I had slept without nightmares for another night. It was, to put it truthfully, really odd. I woke up this morning feeling refreshed and renewed, a rare feeling indeed.

Although excitement seemed to help me sleep, it didn't do Kelsey any good. She claimed to have tossed and turned all night. You couldn't prove it by me. Yet, somehow she still had enough energy stored somewhere inside her to prance around the room.

"We get to ride the Hogwarts' Express! We're going to Hogwarts!" She danced.

"Now, now dear," Her aunt chided. "You'll need to settle sown or you'll fall asleep on the train."

"Not possible!" Kelsey trilled.

"And why would that be?"

"Cali and Oliver sitting in a train car!" Kelsey smirked.

I, in retaliation, threw a pillow at her. "You forgot all of the other people that are sure to be there!"

"Oh yeah? And what happens when we go through a dark tunnel?" Kelsey demanded.

"It gets dark?"

Kelsey rolled her eyes. "And what do lovers do in the dark?"

I picked up the pillow yet again and brought it down hard on Kelsey's head. "Oliver and I are **not** lovers!"

"Oh, you're a filthy dirty stinkin' rotten liar!" Kelsey exclaimed hitting me over the head.

"Ack!" I exclaimed after twenty minutes of constant fighting. "Now I have to brush my hair again before we leave!"

"Ohhhh!" Kelsey taunted.

"What now?" I asked picking my hairbrush up from the vanity.

"Getting ready for Mr. Wood are you?" Mrs. Fewer winked.

"Oh you two!" I sighed, hiding a deep blush.

They laughed as they began to get the rest of our school supplies packed into our trunks. I on the other hand began to run my brush through my wavy red hair.

As always I tried to imagine what traits I got from my mother and which I got from my father. I could never seem to pick the right combinations. My bright red hair and dark brown-eyes. I had a few freckles, but not too many. Perhaps I looked exactly like my father. No, no, I had my mother's eyes… no, no…

I could imagine a woman with red hair like mine, but she didn't have my eyes. I never really knew where the image came from, but I believed it to be true. I never could picture my father, but I knew he was a star. Maybe they would have his name on a plaque somewhere at Hogwarts!

I so couldn't wait!

"Cali, let's go or we'll be late!" Mrs. Fewer interrupted my thoughts.

"Yes, Ma'am!" I reached for my wand and felt the same tingling, warming feeling I felt last night when I had reached for it at last.

Mr. Ollivander had been right when he had said the wand chooses the wizard… well in my case, my wand chose me, a witch. My wand's 13 inches, swish-y, unicorn hair, willow wood.

I-Cali Katz, the girl who could remember nothing of her past- was about to discover-

"Cali! The taxi is going to leave you!" Kelsey yelled.

"Coming!" I dashed down the stairs, diving into the cab with cat-like grace.

"Where to?" asked the driver, his eyebrows quirked slightly due to my stunt.

"King's Cross Train Station, please." Mrs. Fewer directed and the driver nodded.

I was so nervous I was practically bouncing around on my seat. To our advantage, there was little traffic, which greatly surprised me. Where were all the other wizards in training? Wasn't the Hogwarts' Express the only way to Hogwarts? Heck, what did I know?

"Where is- um everyone else?" I asked, lowering my voice.

"They'll be there." Mrs. Fewer promised.

I was slightly confused. Looking out the window I didn't see any people walking, well at least not enough to be the whole United Kingdom's Wizarding Community. After a minute it came to me.

Slapping my forehead, I realized that with magic, something as simple as transportation from point A to point B (i.e. a Wizarding house to King's Cross) would be extremely easy. Not to mention, there would have to be about a bazillilon different ways of going about it. Staring out the window, my eyes glazed over slightly as I began to imagine the possibilities…

It helped to pass the time. I didn't even realize we were there until the car stopped. My mind was still up in the clouds with magic carpets and invisible, flying taxis.

"Come on, Cali! Come on! Come on! Let's go!" Kelsey was dragging me out of the car before I knew it.

"Okay!" I was suddenly bouncing off the walls once more.

Mrs. Fewer handed us both our tickets. "All right, girls. Platform nine and three quarters this way…"

Kelsey and I were jumping up and down with excitement. We couldn't help but look in every possible direction… except for the one Kelsey's aunt took.

"Kelsey…"

"Cali…"

"Oh frogs!" we exclaimed in unison. "Where'd she go?"

Panic quickly engulfed all excitement, snuffing it out completely. Where had she gone? Were we going to miss the train? What time was it? Who were all these random people? Was one of them going to hurt us?

I felt someone slip there hand into mine. Looking down I instantly recognized the blue fingernails. Kelsey's matching blue eyes were intense with fright and yet still held determination in them.

"We're in this together."

I nodded. "Let's think this through logically. Nine and three quarters should be somewhere between nine and ten. So let's head that way."

Kelsey nodded in agreement and we quickly walked over to platform nine. Directly on the other side of the very same pillar was the sign indicting platform number ten. Platform nine and three quarters was nonexistent.

My heart sank. It all really had been a joke and there were so many people in on it. Blaze, Kelsey, Professor Dumbledore… and Oliver… Someone had seriously been cruel enough to lie to an eleven-year-old girl whom couldn't even remember her own birth name.

Dejectedly I leaned against the pillar along the side of number nine and closed my eyes. I was so depressed I could feel myself falling. Falling into the depths of wretched despair. God, why did I have to be so stu-

"AHH! CALLLIIIIIIII!" I heard Kelsey shout.

Suddenly gravity kicked back into gear and I stopped falling with what would normally have been a painful crash. For some reason though, I didn't exactly hit the ground. I had landed on something… or someone. The painful part, I realized was that someone else had landed on top of me.

"Bloody hell!" the person bellow me hollered.

"Ronald Bilis Weasley!" screeched a woman I couldn't see.

"Oh, Mum! Get off his case!"

"Yeah! 'Specially seein' as how someone else is on it at the moment!"

I could have sworn the two voices were identical in pitch.

As soon as Kelsey was off of me I helped a rather young looking Ronald Weasley up off the floor. After apologizing for the third time I looked around. Sure enough there were two identical twin boys waltzing towards me.

"Way to go, Mate!" One cheered.

"Someone should've tackled 'ickle Ronny-kins a long time ago!" the other one smiled.

"Any tackler of Ron, is a friend of ours!" the first one proclaimed. He offered me his right hand. "I'm George Weasley."

"And I'm Fred." The other offered me his hand as well.

"I'm Cali Katz." I smiled shaking both of their hands.

"Wicked!" they chorused.

"And this is my best friend Kelsey."

"Pleasure to see a friendly face once in a while," Fred nodded over to where Mrs. Weasley was giving Ron what appeared to be a strict talking to. "That's Mum," He was pointing at Mrs. Weasley.

"You landed on Ronny-kins, brilliant, by the way."

"That's Percy," Fred lowered his voice, "You'd do best to stir clear of him. He's what we like to call a-"

"Prat." They finished together.

"That's dad," George pointed to an old, balding man. He was holding the hand of a little girl.

"That's Bill."

"That's Charlie."

"And our only sister," they proclaimed proudly. "Ginny!"

"You're all related?" Kelsey demanded.

"Yes." George smiled.

"Can you not see the flaming red hair we all sport?" Fred exclaimed.

"You know, Cali dear, you'd fit right in." Mrs. Weasley was apparently done scolding Ron. "So, are you two first years?"

"Yes, ma'am." I answered.

"So are Fred'n'George. Hogwarts is going to have a difficult time with those two!" Mr. Weasley shook his head with a smile hidden from his wife. "Kelsey, are you originally from the States?"

Kelsey nodded.

"Fascinating!" Mr. Weasley murmured before continuing. "Are you by any chance- or maybe you just know some-Muggle born?"

"I'm not Muggle born. Mom and Dad are both of the American Wizarding community." Mr. Weasley's face fell slightly at that comment. "But Cali and I live in a Muggle orphanage, so we have quite a few Muggle friends."

"Really…" Mr. Weasley immediately started firing question after question at Kelsey.

Fred and George pulled me away before Mr. Weasley had a chance to turn to me. The last thing I heard Kelsey say was, "I-I don't really know, Mr. Weasley. Perhaps you should ask Cali. She's been living with Muggles for as long as she can remember!"

"Just saved you!" Fred smiled.

"Let's find a place to sit," George suggested.

"What about Kelsey?" I asked slightly worried.

"Don't worry, Dad doesn't bite." Fred reassured me.

"Yeah, he's just a harmless Muggle enthusiast."

"So are you Muggle-Born?"

"I'm not sure. I mean, I can't remember anything before my third birthday. But I know one of my parents attended Hogwarts."

"And you know that, how?" George asked.

"Well, you see I have this ability to speak to-"

"Cali!"

I whirled around. I'd know that charming Scottish voice anywhere. "Oliver!"

"Oye! Who's this?" Fred asked.

"Fred, George, this is Oliver Wood," Okay so just saying his name made my eyes light up, I knew it just by the twins' identical expressions. "Oliver, these are the Weasley Twins, Fred and George."

"Actually, I'm George."

"And, I'm Fred."

"You two are dirty liars, you know that?" I turned to Oliver and smiled. "Don't let them confuse you."

"What makes you think you can tell us apart?" Fred demanded.

"Yeah?" George piped up. "Our own Mother can't tell us apart!"

"Annnd you've only just met us!"

"You're Fred and you're George, I just know it! End of story!" I sighed. "It's not nice to confuse people!"

"Neither is it nice to _leave_ people, Cali!" Kelsey said sulkily joining our group.

"Although," Oliver said, ignoring Kelsey's remark. "It would be a good Quidditch strategy…"

"Quidditch?" Kelsey and I asked together.

Before any of the guys could answer our question the train blew its whistle for the last time. Mrs. Weasley came bustling over to us. She showered the twins with kisses and hugs before turning to Percy.

"Make sure you look after those two, Percy, dear."

"Fred, George, at least _try _to behave yourselves!" Mr. Weasley said in place of a good-bye.

"Good-bye, Cali, Kelsey. It was nice to meet you, dears. Be safe and take care of Fred and George for me. They're quite a handful…" Mrs. Weasley then ushered us onto the train.

"Quick, let's find a seat before she starts blubbering…" Fred remarked straight-faced.

"I can't believe they're all full!" George exclaimed after we had searched just about every car.

"We did board late." Oliver remarked.

"Here's one with room for five." I called.

"How about six?" Percy came gliding from the other direction.

I leaned into the car. Inside was a boy who looked to be about my age with dark skin and hazel eyes. His black hair was just long enough to begin forming dread locks. "Excuse me, but do you have room for six?"

"Do I ever!" the boy exclaimed jumping to his feet. "I was beginning to think I was the only first year on board!"

"How bogus!" Fred snorted pushing past me to see the boy.

"I know!" the boy didn't even seem fazed. "So glad you're here. You saved me from boredom! I'm Lee-Jordan by the way."

"'M Fred and this is my twin, George." Fred smirked and I noticed that they didn't try to confuse Lee-Jordan. "And our motto is-"

"When the going gets boring, make it hilarious!" the twins finished together.

"Rather corny if you ask me. I'm Percy Weasley, care taker of these… baboons if you will, while at Hogwarts."

"CORNY?!" Fred and George shouted in rage.

"It's better than yours!" George pouted.

"Yeah," Fred mimicked Percy's serious facial expression. "When the going gets rough, study harder.'"

I rolled my eyes and pushed past the twins, making room for everyone else to enter the compartment. "I'm Cali Katz and these are my friends, Kelsey and Oliver."

"Nice to meet you guys. I'm sure we'll have fun at Hogwarts together." Lee-Jordan smiled.

"Oliver! Oliver, Mate, where are you?"

"In here!" Oliver called, opening the door to our train compartment, a large smile spreading across his face.

A moment later a boy about Oliver's age with blonde hair and brown eyes ran into the compartment. "Oliver! Man, a summer is just, too, long!"

"Tell me about it!" Oliver stood and embraced the boy in a sort of half hug, half punch kind of gesture. "Cali this is my best friend, Peter. Peter, this is Cali."

"Nice to meet you Cali. Say, d'you see catch the QWC?" Peter had gone back to talking to Oliver.

"Yeah! It was bloody brilliant! Did you see when that Chinese Keeper knocked away the bludger? I've been trying to do that for _ages_. I think I've finally got it. M gonna use it at try outs."

"I'm going for chaser."

"Where's Franki?" Oliver asked suddenly changing the subject.

Between being totally confused and wicked hyper, I was rather glad Oliver's two friends were both guys.

"I don't-"

"Pepè !" trilled a Hispanic, _female_ voice. " Pepè ¿Dondé estás? Are you hiding from me?"

Okay, so maybe one of his friends was a girl but… maybe she was into Peter? I crossed my fingers mentally.

"In here, Franki and why on earth would I hide from you, Beautiful?" Peter's tone was teasing, but he was dead on.

Franki was drop dead gorgous. She had jet black hair and an olive tan, bright green eyes and long legs for a second year. Fearfully I turned to Oliver. Yeah, we weren't lovers, or anything close to it, but I still liked him… even if he had a crush on this completely hott looking Spanish girl.

"Franki!" Oliver hugged the girl afer she had hugged Peter.

"Oliver!" Her pronunciation of Oliver's name was foreign to my ears. It sounded like "oooo-lee-beh-rr". "¿Comó estás? How was your summer?"

"Muy bien…" Oliver stumbled slightly with the Spanish. "My summer was great! How was yours?"

"Okay." Franki shrugged. "Oh, wow. There are a ton of new faces."

"My bad!" Oliver introduced as all, except for Percy who had left to make room for Franki, claming it, "too noisy in here to study any how".

After introductions the guys jumped right back into their Quidditch pitch. They talked on and on… it made me wonder just how one tracked a boys mind could be… Franki on the other hand didn't seem interested in their talk. Instead she talked to Kelsey and me.

"¿De dondé están?" she asked us.

"I'm from, well, I'm assuming England somewhere," I answered remembering some of the Spanish Blaze had taught me. "Kelsey on the other hand is from-"

"America?" Franki smiled. "Here your accent is rather distinct, the same as mine and Oliver's."

Even at her odd pronunciation of his name I still smiled. At the sound of his name in out conversation, Oliver shifted slightly in his seat. His leg brushed against mine, causing me to blush as shivers ran up and down my spine. I couldn't help but smile harder.

Franki winked at me, catching my blush. "Aye! Oliver es tu amor! Pepè is my sweet heart, right Pepè?"

"Wha-?" Peter asked, startled to have a non-Quidditch question thrown at him.

Kelsey, Franki and I laughed at him, causing Oliver to shift again. Kelsey sighed and laid her head against the window as Franki took Peter's hand.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"I'm beginning to feel claustrophobic in here with all y'all love birds…"

"Yeah, I'm sure…" Suddenly the compartment door slide open cutting me off.

"Anything off the trolley, dears?" asked a sweet looking old witch pushing a cart full of sweets.

Our whole group got up and tried to surge forward at once. It didn't work so well. Fred, George, Lee-Jordan and Oliver, being the closest four to the door were there first. Oliver surprised Kelsey and I by buying candy for the remaining four of us still sitting.

"Here, judging slightly by the ice cream you ate yesterday and my personal favorites, you should like these, Cali." Oliver was blushing slightly as he gave me a strawberry pastry, and a chocolate frog. "Your favorites, Peter, Franki."

He handed them candies as well. Then he handed some to Kelsey. "I didn't know what to buy you so I just grabbed you some chocolate frogs. I'm sorry. Do they have candy like this in America?"

"Yes, and thank you very much, Oliver. Cali sure does have good taste in men." She beamed up at him.

Oliver and I were blushing pretty bad, but the twins came to our rescue.

"Here, Cali! You have to try some Berty Botts' Every Flavor Beans!" Fred said giving me a handful. I watched as Lee-Jordan gave some to Kelsey.

"Do they mean, "Every Flavor"?" I couldn't help but ask.

When George nodded I must have had a horrible expression on my face because everybody was laughing. Oliver took one of the jellybeans and placed it in his mouth. We were all laughing about the face he was making.

"Mmm, grass…" we only laughed harder.

The door opened once more and Percy poked his head in. He looked and sounded rather cross. "What is so funny? I can hear you lot three cars down!"

"Must've been with Penelope!" Fred and George teased.

Percy turned five different shades of red. "Shut your faces! And! Change into your robes! We are almost to Hogwarts!"

At that, we girls forced all the boys out into the hall so we could change.

"Hey, Franki, what's Quidditch?" After hearing the guys talk about it nonstop I wanted to know what it was.

"Eh? Well, I've seen it played before and all, but if you want all the dirt, I suggest you ask tu amor. The guys know more about it than I do, but please, wait until later. You really don't want to get them started on Quidditch again."

Kelsey and I laughed as we opened the door and stepped out into the hall. "Okay, your turn guys!"

We were only out in the hallway for what seemed to be five seconds. When we walked back in we saw why. The guys didn't care what they looked like. Their hair was all ruffled and their robes were slanted and sloppy looking. They had also managed to rearrange themselves.

Oliver was now sitting by the window across from Peter who was sitting on the right side. Empty seats were next to both of them. Fred and George were sitting next to the empty seat on Peter's side, George closest to the door. Lee was sitting across from George, leaving three empty seats total.

Franki sat down next to Peter and Fred, leaving Kelsey and I to sit down in the other two seats. I, of course, sat next to Oliver, and Kelsey took the remaining seat next to Lee-Jordan. Both of them seemed pleased with the arrangement and I was happy to see Kelsey immediately join in on the conversation the twins and Lee-Jordan were having. It was something about at beginning of the year prank or what not. Right before turning my full attention to Oliver and his friends I saw Lee-Jordan shift closer to Kelsey similar to the way Oliver had done earlier.

Smiling I nudged Oliver and the older group turned in time for Lee-Jordan to shift again. The older children snickered quietly as to not ruin the moment. We were all smiles.

Franki mouthed to me, "That's almost as cute as you and Oliver."

"Yeah," Peter smirked having no clue what Franki had just implied. "He definitely likes Kelsey."

He moved closer to Franki and nodded, with a sly wink, at Oliver. Who then shifted again, but it wasn't enough for me to consider him any closer. Sighing quietly, I blushed simply for wanting him to move closer.

"George, love, I feel slightly left out." Fred pouted, having noticed how everybody else in the car seemed to have shifted closer to someone than they had.

"Yes, Fred, dear. Hold my hand so we fit in?" George's voice was sticky sweet as they grabbed each other's hand and pretended to cuddle.

The rest of us, completely grossed out, jumped about ten feet into the air and then scooted as far from each other as possible.

"Hmm, seems to have worked, brother, dear." Fred laughed.

"Ahh, the pleasures of being twins," George agreed.

Oliver shook his head. "Keep you're twincest you yourselves!"

"Oooh, you know you wanna join us." Fred taunted him, winking at me.

"HELL NO!" Oliver looked like a caged animal.

"But you weren't all over Cali…" George reasoned. "Doesn't that mean you're-"

"STORY TIME!" Peter called, coming to Oliver's rescue. "You first years should be warned before they make you wear, the brain sucking sorting hat!"

"Brain sucking?" Kelsey asked skeptically, her eyebrow quirked.

Franki slapped her forehead. "That's the best you could come up with?"

"Something along the lines of; "they make you fight a dragon, defeat a troll and other sorts of tests" would have been better." Fred thought out loud.

"Wicked! I bet Ronny-kins'll believe that!" George cheered thumping his twin on the back.

**Author's Notes: **Long time no Update, I know and I'm sorry. I hope you had as much fun reading this as I did writing it! I'll try'n get the next one up sooner, but again, no promises.


	7. Sorting and Such

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer**: Yeah... I so write for a living. I mean I post a chapter like, what-every month? I am so the responsible, punctual posting JK Rowling :P

**Author's Notes:** Again, I have to apologize for how late this update is. Thank yous go out to Luna32.

**Chapter Seven Sorting and Such**

Upon arriving at Hogwarts, everything was simply utter chaos for Kelsey and I. Firstly, we got off the train expecting to be at Hogwarts. Instead, we were surrounded by water on three sides with a large castle off in the distance. The third side was a forest with humongous trees and empty carriages without horses. We were perplexed beyond belief, and my first thought was that we had gotten off at the wrong stop.

The second reason for our confused demeanor consisted of a rather large (and dear god I do mean LARGE) man standing near a cluster of row boats. This man was so tall, he stood halfway up the trees littering the station... And these weren't tiny trees either... They were like rain-forest; been growing for over one hundred years, trees. Not only was he wickedly tall, but he had the wildest hair I have ever laid eyes on. I mean, one look at _that_ head of hair and I regret calling my own hair unruly. It was so tangled and covered almost his whole face! I swear, if he wasn't calling out, "FIRST YEARS THIS WAY!" I would have bet Fred and George all of my Wizarding money that he was either born with his head on backwards or entirely faceless.

That would have been the third thing to complex Kelsey and I to no end; the fact that he was shouting at first years, not the question of whether or not he possessed a face. We had assumed we would be going to school with Oliver, Peter and Franki, but they were headed away from the water and towards the forest.

Oliver looked over his shoulder at me and waved. I was too nervous to even wave back. Oliver must've noticed this because he called something out, but I couldn't decipher what it was he was saying over the loud din of the students emerging from the train. Although he was still facing me, he was instantly swallowed up by the crowd like his message had been.

"FIRST YEARS!"

"So..." Fred remarked.

"This way, then?" George asked, nudging me towards the boats.

I nodded, grabbing Kelsey's hand. "You don't suppose he's half giant, do you?" I whispered to her.

She smiled nervously and replied, "Ya never know..."

"FIRST YEARS GATHER 'ROUND!"

"Hagrid!" The twins cried simultaneously at the hairy man.

The massive head of hair turned our way and smiled. "'Ello, Fred, George. Welcome to Hogwarts!"

"You know him?" I asked in awe.

Fred nodded. "Of course, have you NOT seen our older brothers?"

"There are three of them! All with bright red hair like ours, Cal." George informed me, pointing between his twin and himself.

I smirked. "Right, sorry."

We got in the boats as Hagrid instructed. It took a while for every first year to get into a boat, but Kelsey, Fred, George and Lee Jordan all shared a boat with me and I was glad. I was beginning to wonder which of us would get stuck rowing when the ors started moving on their own. I'll admit it, I was utterly freaked out, causing Fred and George to laugh at me. The magic world was seriously going to take some getting used to.

We passed through a tunnel, veiled by dark, heavy veins. I almost didn't duck my head in time, which of course caused the Twins to laugh more. But I couldn't laugh. I was seized by a fear so powerful, so intense, I couldn't even breath. The cave was pitch black, with only the small lanterns on each of the boats for light. I felt as though I was back in the closet, the lantern light turning into a solid line peeking under the door. The dark fingers of the lake and veins reaching out for me.

Kelsey and Lee Jordan were busy whispering about how they were going to pull off their first prank at Hogwarts. Would they do it before or after the sorting? I heard them talking, but their words meant nothing. I knew where I was wasn't the closet of my childhood, but, as if in two places as once, I watched in horror for the dark, evil bodiless voice to open the closet door and find me, to draw me entirely into the dark forever.

I felt a hand on my arm, but it was as if I was in a different body. I felt it, but I didn't.

"Cali." I heard my name, but it wasn't my name. I didn't know the voice.

"Cali!" But it kept persisting, and then doubled. "CALI!"

I tore my eyes from the line of light and looked up. The sight of their red hair and freckles brought me to the present instantly. Fred and George were both tugging on my arms, trying to get me out of the boat.

"Cali, we're already behind! Come on, Cali... we'll get lost. Everybody else is already in the castle."

"What?" I asked, sounding dazed even to my own ears. Looking around, I realized that, as George had said, everybody else had left the boats. We really were the only ones left standing on the rocks.

After helping me out of the boat, George let go of my arm, where as Fred slipped his grip to my hand. Giving it a tight squeeze he asked, "Everything okay?"

"Yes, you can let go of my hand now," I said only half-heartedly. I knew that if he let go of my hand, I might fall back into a panicked, conscious comma.

"These rocks are slipperier than they look, Cal. I'm not holding onto your hand 'cuz I like you. I'm holding onto your hand 'cuz I like me and, just between you and me, I'm shallow, and I only like myself for my pretty face. So if I fall and bruise it, I might stop liking myself. So bear with me, 'kay?"

"Liar." I remarked, not letting go of his hand, some what glad that he was smart enough to know that I was still suffering, even if I wouldn't admit it.

"Okay, so maybe I like my funny side too, but come on, there is so not anything funny about being injured!" And, as if to prove his point, he almost slipped.

Some how, Fred, George and I made it up to the castle unharmed. And luckily for us, the doors to the castle (as huge as they were) were still open. We slipped in and joined the group unnoticed. A slender woman who carried an air of strictness about her was giving a speech as we approached, and, even though she saw us appear later than the others, she didn't pause in her speech giving.

"Welcome to Hogwarts. The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room.

"The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. Will the three of you who came in late please come forward?" Her speech seemed to have come to its close and now the Twins and I were about to get busted.

Everyone watched as we came forward. I saw heads turning. "You do realize that punctuality is vital to all things here at Hogwarts, do you not?"

I nodded, and saw out of the corner of my eyes the Twins following my lead. "Then I highly suggest you start now," She looked between Fred and I and added, "Meaning you follow all rules, including the ones on PDA."

I looked down at our hands, still interlocked. "No," I said quickly, pulling my hand from Fred's. "It's not what it looks like! We weren't late because we were doing anything like that!"

The woman quirked one eyebrow and demanded, "Then what is it that you were doing?"

"I-I was -"

"I almost fell, and Cali was making sure that I made it safely." Fred remarked.

"I do believe that points should be awarded to her for her heroism," George added. "She could have hurt herself trying to help my brother here get into the castle."

I felt my face flush.

"I'm sure," She remarked, a quizzical look upon her face. "I shall be back soon to retrieve all of you for the Sorting."

I sighed as she disappeared through a door and the chatter of all the other students filled the small chamber for only a moment. "Thanks guys."

"No problem."

"Anytime."

"No, I'm serious," I said. "Thank you, for helping me even though I refused to admit that I needed it."

"Like we said earlier..." George stated flatly. "No problem. We'll be here for you always, mate."

"Yeah." Fred added. "What kind of friends would we be otherwise?"

I felt my heart swell with emotion at their words. I felt like the most special girl in the world at that moment. And then Kelsey appeared at my elbow with Lee Jordan beside her.

"Where were you guys?" She demanded. "PDA? Cali I thought you liked Oliver."

"I DO!" I exclaimed. "I mean... I don't... IT WASN'T PDA! Fred was just there when I needed him... I, the dark..."

Kelsey's eyes widened as she threw her arms around me. "The Dark! Oh, Cali, I'm _so_ sorry! I completely forgot, I was... I was talking to-"

"Lee Jordan?" I asked, smiling. "It's okay."

"So," Lee asked look us each in the face in turn. "Which house do you think you'll to end up in?"

"We're gonna end up in Gryffindor," George stated flat out, pointing between himself and Fred.

"How do you know?" I asked.

"It's in our blood," Fred answered, then whispered in my ear, so nobody else could hear, "So, you're afraid of the dark?"

I nodded for his benefit, and mused out loud, "I wonder, which house is in my blood?"

Kelsey smiled. "I dunno... I'm kinda wonderin' the same thing about me."

"Looks like we'll know in a couple of minutes," Lee stated as the door began to open again. "Let's make a pact, here and now, that no matter which house each of us ends up in, we'll be friends all throughout our schooling. Everybody in?"

We all cheered "Yes!" simultaneously as the same woman before entered again.

"Settle down," Her voice was quiet, yet stern and had the students paying attention as if she had shouted. "The Ceremony is about to begin, line up single file and follow me."

The professor opened the door wider and we all filed out of the room, Fred and George in front of me, Kelsey and Lee Jordan behind me. As we entered, the first thing I noticed were all of the faces, some smiling, some scowling, at us. There were so many of them. Looking at all of them made me feel small and alone.

Some one whistled and I searched for the source, thinking it to be Oliver. Oliver. My eyes swept over the crowd as if they were under a new light. I looked, but I couldn't pick his face out from the hundreds in the Great Hall. I was slowly losing hope of ever seeing his adorable face again when Kelsey poked me in the back.

"Look at the ceiling!"

At her invitation, I looked up and felt as if I were back outside in the dark. It was truly amazing. There were stars painted on the top, almost twinkling. I didn't realize that they were actual stars until a cloud moves across one corner, causing me to gasp.

"It moved!"

Fred heard my exclamation and turned around. "Yeah, it's not real though. Bill told me it's just bewitched to look like the sky."

"So it changes?" I asked in astonishment.

"Yeah, by morning, the ceiling will resemble what ever it looks like outside."

"Even if it's raining?"

"Even if it's raining."

We had reached the front of the Great Hall by the time I had relaid this information to Kelsey. The female teacher had disappeared again, only to reappear with a four legged stool and an old, patched hat. She sat both of which in the very center of the raised lip on the floor, the hat on top of the stool. I stared in wonderment.

What did a hat and a stool have to do with which house we ended up in? I felt the doubt I had experienced at the train station creep back into the pit of my stomach. But it was quickly washed away by my new found belief in magic, and the fact that the hat was now moving. It could have been the lighting of the sky-ceiling, or just my eyes in general. It was getting kind of late, so maybe the random twitching was just all in my head. Yes... that had to be the answer, or so I thought until the a rip in the stitching opened wide like a mouth and a whispery voice emitted from the old pointed wizard's hat sitting on the stool.

"_Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,_

_But Don't judge on what you see,_

_I'll eat myself if you can find _

_A smarter hat than me." _The hat was singing. I felt myself swoon slightly before I realized that I didn't know the melody of the song. _"You can keep your bowlers black,_

_Your top hats sleek and tall,_

_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_

_And I can top them all._

_There's nothing hidden in your head_

_The Sorting Hat can't see,_

_So try me on and I will tell you_

_Where you ought to be._

_You might belong in Gryffindor,_

_Where dwell the brave at heart,_

_Their daring, nerve, and chivalry_

_Set Gryffindors apart;_

_You might belong in Hufflepuff,_

_Where they are just and loyal,_

_Those patient Hufflepuffs are true_

_And unafraid of toil;_

_Or yet in wise Ravenclaw,_

_If you've a ready mind,_

_Where those of wit and learning,_

_Will always find their kind;_

_Or perhaps in Slytherin_

_You'll make your real friends,_

_Those cunning folk use any means_

_To achieve their ends._

_So put me on! Don't be afraid!_

_And don't get in a flap!_

_You're save in my hands (though I have none)_

_For I am the Thinking Cap!"_

I was amazed, to say the least and found myself applauding the Sorting Hat with the rest of the students in the Great Hall.

I heard someone from the table of scowling youths mutter sourly, "Why is it always the same bloody song? If it were truly a 'Thinking Cap' then why in the name of You-Know-Who, couldn't it come up with something different from time to time?"

"You-Know-Who?" I asked Fred, but before he could answer, the strict woman cut him off.

"When I call your name, come forth and place the Sorting Hat on your head," She was now holding a scroll that, unraveled as it was, reached the floor and then some. "Aalune, Kristine!"

A short girl with brown hair walked forward and placed the hat upon her head. I smiled nervously as the hat slipped over her eyes and remained still. I nearly jumped a mile in the air when it shouted, "RAVENCLAW!"

"Akkies, Melony!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Ashmior, Steffen."

"SLYTHERIN!"

After awhile I stopped paying attention and went back to looking for Oliver. I had little luck, while I had narrowed the Gryffindor table down to the one on the far left, I still couldn't find him. I did get distracted when, as Fred called her, Professor McGonagall called, "Brawning, Kelsey!"

The Hat seemed to take longer than usual before calling out, "RAVENCLAW!"

I realized at that moment that the Ravenclaw table sported Kelsey's favorite color, blue. I also realized that she had ended up in a different house than Oliver was in. I remembered how, in the Bookstore, Oliver had commented that he thought I was going to end up in Ravenclaw because I was so quick with the currency rates. At that moment I felt so torn.

The rest of the names seemed to pass too quickly. "Katz, Cali!" Was I ready to be placed?

I walked forward slowly, sitting down hesitantly. I pulled the Hat on and right before it slipped over my eyes, I saw Oliver. He was leaning forward, brow furrowed in deep concentration as he awaited my placing.

"_Ah..."_ A voice in my ear whispered, making me jump so hard I could have toppled off of the stool. Luckily I didn't. "_Do you have a crush on Oliver Wood? No, well, just keep telling yourself that, Cali, and someday, it just might be true. But as for the present, we're here to discuss your future House._

"_You've got your closest friend in Ravenclaw, and you're smart too, but Ravenclaw isn't where your heart it. You've been through rough times and you've managed to make it this far. Most people your age wouldn't have lived through what you have. _

"_You've also got a fear of the dark. One so large that it could swallow you entirely, but, deep within you, is the power to drive that fear away. With the help of Gryffindor, you'll be able to do just that and perhaps unlock your past as well as the heart of Oliver Wood._

"_Yes... Gryffindor seems best, _GRYFFINDOR!"

As the Hat was pulled off of my head and tried on by the next kid, I walked numbly to the Gryffindor table. Oliver stood up and waved me over. Franki gave me a hug and Peter whistled. Percy nodded at me and the twins were going spastic still standing in line. The only person I could really think about was Kelsey and the pact Lee Jordan had made us swear to only moments before. I hoped, at that moment, will all of my heart that the pact survived.

By the end of the sorting, Fred and George had ended up in Gryffindor like they had claimed, along with Lee Jordan. I noticed him looking over at the Ravenclaw table about as much as I did and I whispered to him, "She'll hold up her end of the pact."

"So will I," He promised.

I smiled and nodded. "Friends forever!"

Fred and George joined in with my cheer, holding up their goblets in Kelsey's direction. "Friends Forever!"

Kelsey smiled and shouted the message back, toasting and empty goblet back at us. I joined in, only to slosh a drink all over Oliver.

My eyes widened as I apologized, telling him that I had thought the goblet was empty. Oliver just shrugged it off and laughed as my eyes widened further. The previously empty table had filled with food magically just as my drinking glass had filled mysteriously with pumpkin juice.

"I love watching your facial expressions when it comes to magic," Oliver muttered, reaching around me to get the bowl of mashed potatoes. "Promise you'll let me show around tomorrow before breakfast?"

"Are you making fun of me?" I demanded, reaching across him for the stake platter.

"Not at all," He answered truthfully.

I nodded slowly. "It's a date."

He smiled too, taking a drink from his glass. "Great."

"I ask of your attention please!" A tall man with the most stunning silver hair I have ever seen stood up, glancing out at us with x-ray blue eyes over half-moon spectacles.

"That's Professor Dumbledore," Oliver whispered for my benefit. "The Headmaster. McGonagall teaches Transfiguration. The big bloke with the wild hair is Hagrid, he's the caretaker the one with greasy hair is Snape and he teaches potions, the short one is Flitwick, he teaches Charms..."

"... Quidditch try outs will start the second week of term, and all students please know that the Forbiden Forest is off limits to all. Enjoy your meal and let this year at Hogwarts be even more amazing than last!"

**Author's Notes:** I'm sorry for the slow update. Yes, I had McGonagall use the same speech she gave Harry's class. I figure that if the Sorting Hat keeps the same song, then McGonagall probably keeps the same speech. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. A review would be amazing, but I understand if I don't get any.


	8. Two Weeks In

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer**: Golly Gee Beave! Would you look at that girl in the shiny window! She doesn't look like J.K. Rowling... oh wait, that'd be a mirror...

**Author's Notes:** Yep it's here (finally), but where are you?

**Thank yous**: Thank you Kitty Kat

**Chapter Eight Two Weeks In**

I went to bed that night, pleasantly full and slightly intoxicated on Oliver. Just sitting with him erased all my fears of the darkness, Fred's warmth and of Kelsey's absence. I didn't remember her until she appeared in my dreams. As enthusiastic as I was for the "date" Oliver and I were going to have the next day, the impact of being so fare from the orphanage hit me like a ton of bricks. It wasn't until I woke up form my night terrors without Haley, Jen, Yasmine, Jasmine, Alley, and the other girls from the orphanage, that I realized how far from home I was.

It was funny really, because I had never thought of the orphanage as home, until I had left it. My friends, at such a distance, suddenly seemed like sisters; missing appendages.

I guess it didn't help that I didn't know any of the faces staring blankly. I had to have been spoiled back at home, because, not a single girl in my dormitory even gave my shrieks and sniffles any consent. Needless to say, i ended up crying myself to sleep.

When I finally woke up the next morning, my eyes were sore and crusted over from my tears. The sun light on my eyelids was so warm and comforting that I didn't want to move. A nice cat nap would have been great. But, as it was, when I rolled over, I realized I was the only one still in the room.

"Crap."

I got up, moving quickly. I threw the covers back on my bed, not really realizing how lumpy they looked at the time. I threw off my night gown without a second thought and slipped into the school uniform wondering frantically what time classes started. My panic sending any fatigue back to where ever it had come from in the first place. I had finished lacing my shoe and was attempting to do something with my hair when I heard the strangest noise I had ever heard.

It was a mix between a call and a shout, with a grating sound reminding me of rock on rock, followed by a horrid "oof!" and a sound that made me cringe- skin on rock.

I threw open the dorm door in time to see Fred land in a heap at the end of the stairca- stair-slide. The stair case had ended up as a stair slide. It had prevented him from reaching my dorm door, the first on the staircase- er slide...

"Fred!" I attempted the slide on my feet, but ended up in a four legged crouch by my friend's head.

He looked up, blushing slightly. "'M alright, Cal."

"What on earth just happened?" I demanded as he righted himself.

"You missed Oliver's date," He pointed to the couch where Oliver was slumped, somehow managing to sleep through Fred's dilemma. "And I was worried... some of the girls who left early for breakfast had been complaining about a girl having had night terrors all night."

I suddenly felt Fred's warm hand on mine. I looked up into his deep brown eyes, my own suddenly watering. I wasn't alone and then impact hit me like a freight train.

"Was it the -" When I had suddenly thrown my arms around his neck, he'd been so taken aback that he had to clear his throat and start over. "Was it because of the dark?"

I let go of his neck and nodded slowly. "And a bit of home sickness."

He smiled at me warmly and patted my shoulder awkwardly, still blushing from my random hug. "Know how that goes."

I resisted the sudden urge to hug him again and he nodded over at Oliver, sending my heart pounding. "Looks like you weren't the only one who couldn't sleep last night. Better go wake up Sleeping Beauty. Breakfast is over in half an hour."

I gave Fred one last smile before standing and offering him a hand up. He didn't take it however, and shoved himself upright using the floor. I walked tensely over to the couch where Oliver was slouched, sound asleep. His sleeping form sent shivers up and down my spine.

He looked so peaceful and fragile. As if all it would take to send him away forever would be one simple touch... And yet, that was all I wanted to do- reach out and touch him.

The thought made me feel guilty. I jumped and looked around, but it was just the two of us- me and Oliver. Even Fred had conveniently disappeared. Oliver and I had the entire common room to ourselves.

Out of nervous habit, I scanned the room once more, taking in the study tables at the back of the room near the boys' staircase, the chess tables near the girls', the open area around the back side of the Fat Lady's portrait and the Message Board, and finally, the warm fireplace before me. Oliver and I were sitting on a large couch with room for about six. A coffee table was before us, with two over-sized chairs on either end, cheerfully capping off the cozy little area nicely.

My eyes landed back on Oliver's vulnerable form and I realized how hungry I suddenly was. I thought about just getting up and leaving but I couldn't do that to him. He either got up extremely early or hadn't slept, but either way, he'd still been waiting for me. Half of me just wanted to sit there and watch him sleep.

The other rumbled with hunger. So I leaned forward, feeling as guilty as a child sneaking a cookie from the cookie jar as I tapped him lightly on the shoulder. He jumped instantly at my touch, making me blush.

"Huh?" He demanded, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.

"Morning, Sleepy Head," I said playfully.

"Cali?" His eyes widened. "I'm sorry! Our before breakfast date-"

I chuckled, cutting him off, drawling his eyes to my own. "S'okay, Oliver. You can show me around tomorrow... under one condition."

"One condition?"

My stomach grumbled and we both laughed before I added, "Okay, two. One: you actually have to get some sleep tonight."

"And two?"

"We make it to breakfast."

He smiled at me. "Deal," he said before taking my hand. "I know a short cut."

We made the last fifteen minutes of breakfast. I was amazed to see that the tables were just as full as the night before. But my surprise was easily forgotten thanks to my hunger. As if I hadn't eaten enough last night or something. I began eating as soon as i sat down next to Fred.

He smiled at me, and George rolled his eyes towards my hair.

"Crap!" I reached up and realized it was only half up thanks to Fred's stair stunt.

I was attempting to fix it when both Fred and Oliver stopped me. "It looks cute!" they chimed, surprising just about everyone at the table.

Franki rolled her eyes and sat her toast back down on her plate. She then proceeded to leave Peter's side and walked around the table so she was standing on our side, before she began to fix my hair for me. "Let me get it, Cali."

"Gracias, Franki."

"No hay de que, Amiga."

It was just as she was finishing up that Professor Dumbledore stood up and the Great Hall became silent. "Welcome to our first day of classes. This is a day to make lasting impressions and inexcusable mistakes, fore all will be forgiven today. But, before you can do either, you will need your schedules, so if all students would kindly return to their own tables..."

It was at that point that I realized that Lee Jordan wasn't at our table. My head instantly turned towards the Ravenclaw table, and sure enough, Lee Jordan was just leaving Kelsey's side. I caught her eye and waved frantically. She smiled and waved back in the same spastic manor.

Surprisingly, Lee Jordan wasn't the only student sitting at the wrong table. Several Ravenclaws left from either the Slytherin or Gryffindor tables and a ton of Hufflepuffs suddenly populated a recently empty table. As the students returned Dumbledore waited patiently.

Once the commotion was over he continued, "The Head of Houses would like to pass out your schedules."

Professor McGonagall was our Head of House and I asked Oliver how long she'd had the position. He had simply shrugged, muttering something about how she was nearly as old as Dumbledore. "She's the Deputy Headmistress, too," He added as she handed the both of us our schedules. "Thank you, Ma'am."

"Wood," she nodded, about to walk past, then paused, whispering; "You had better not skip out on tryouts..."

Oliver smiled at her as she walked away. I gave him a questionable look and her replied, "She can't stand to lose to Slytherin."

I rolled my eyes, not actually knowing what he was talking about, but fearful to admit to it. Instead of asking about it further, I turned to my schedule. I smiled as I read through it. I had potions first with Slytherin- not my reason for smiling I assure you-, transfiguration with Ravenclaw, Herbology with Hufflepuff and then Charms with Ravenclaw today. Tomorrow I'd have double Potions, flying- which was held with all first years- and double Defense Against the Dark Arts. Each day afterward had two different classes that were doubled in length.

I couldn't wait.

After about two weeks time and Oliver's help, I had managed to find my way around Hogwarts. I was no longer always ending up in the dead end corridor on the third floor, or the Gryffindor Common Room. I had also found out which classes I liked, and those of which I didn't.

Charms and Transfiguration were my favorites where as Potions and Herbology I could do without. Potions because of the teacher- who in their right mind could like Snape?- and Herbology? Hello... I don't exactly have a green thumb when it comes to normal- er, Muggle plants, let alone ones that cry or tend to bite you...

It was right as I was finishing my dreaded Potions' essay in study hall before dinner that Oliver bounded over to me. He had been excited all day, not eating, barely talking.

"Are you coming after dinner?" He whispered.

"What?" I asked, laughing softly at his manor. It was just too cute to over look.

"Are you coming to watch the Qudditch try outs?" He elaborated.

"I can do that?"

He nodded. "But just for your House... Say you'll come!"

"What?" Franki demanded, coming up behind him. "I'm not good enough anymore?"

Oliver blushed, unsure of how to answer the question, but Franki just smiled shaking her head. "I'm just kidding, Oliver."

"You'll be there, Franki?" I asked, still not knowing how to respond to Oliver's exclamation.

"Sí," she nodded.

"All right! I'll be there."

"Count us in," Fred, George, and Lee Jordan all cheered.

"Okay," Oliver looked so excited he almost appeared feverish.

"Hey," I said, catching his arm as he walked past me. "Have you eaten anything at all today?"

When he shook his head I shot him a dirty look.

"Ooo," Fred sang cheerfully. "Looks like someone's getting force-fed tonight."

Oliver chuckled, actually smiling. "I might need it."

I rolled my eyes, but an hour later, that's exactly what I was doing. Kelsey was sitting across the table, next to Lee Jordan. The Twins were across from him, on my right, and Oliver was on my left. Peter and Franki next to Kelsey. I was halfway done with dinner when I realized he wasn't eating.

"Oliver..."

"Cali, I'm not hungry."

I glared at him and he flinched.

"If I eat, I'll just throw it up later," and it really did appear as if he was telling the truth. He looked greener than the pea soup sitting in front of him.

"Oliver! You haven't eaten all day! If you don't eat something you're not going to make it to tryouts! Or worse! You'll pass out, fifty feet in the air or something!"

I must have sounded convincing because he finally reached for the soup. I turned to Peter, who was trying out tonight as well.

"I'm eating!" He declared before pointing to Franki. "She beat you to it."

"So," George demanded. "You gonna make sure Fed, Lee and I eat when we try out next year."

"You bet!" Franki, Kelsey and I told him before we all broke out into a fix of giggles.

"Do you two have your own brooms?" Fred asked, talking to Peter and Oliver.

Peter shook his head. "I think my neighbors would all die of shock if I were to practice in my backyard. But Dad said he'd get me one if I made the team. He'll even put an illusionary barrier around the house for me."

"I've got my own, but it's not here. If I make the team, Mum'll send it in by Post."

The Morning Post had been amazing. I saw hundreds of thousands of owls fly in at breakfast. They had all been muttering the names of the students they had been looking for. But there had been so many that it was just mind blowing. I'd even managed to catch one and write a quick note on a napkin to the girls back home. Oliver had laughed at my expression for that first sighting as well, but try as I might, I couldn't see an owl carrying Oliver's broomstick to school.

"What's the illusionary barrier for?" I asked.

"Peter lives in a Muggle Neighborhood." Franki explained.

"My Mum wanted to be closer to her Mum," Peter shrugged. "Dad was happy to oblige."

I nodded as the plates cleared. "So, is you're mum a..."

"Muggle-born Witch," He smiled. "She and Dad met here at Hogwarts. Your folks?"

"Dunno... wish I did though."

Oliver stood up, looking nervous and unsteady. I took his hand, standing beside him, only coming up to his shoulder in height. "It'll be okay. You'll see. One day, you're even going to be the Gryffindor Quidditch Captain!"

"If you say so..." But he was smiling again.

We sat in the stands, tall boxes with wooden bleachers that lined the entire Pitch. I'd been to the Quidditch Pitch before for flying classes, but never in the stands. It was exhilarating being up so high, almost like flying, simply missing that horrid, stomach churning feeling of falling to one's death. I was a natural born spectator.

Quidditch wasn't as confusing as Franki claimed, but that might have been because I actually paid attention during Flying lessons... I was able to follow what was going on so far, then again it was only try outs. After about thirty minutes in, I could honestly tell you that Oliver had to be the best guy trying out for Keeper. He could use some work, but hey, nobody's perfect, right? And it looked like Peter just might have a spot, considering there was more than one position for chaser open.

Tryouts lasted an hour, and McGonagall ended the ordeal by telling the students surrounding her and Madam Hooch, "The results will be posted on the Notice Board in your Common room at the end of the week. You are all dismissed."

**Author's Notes: **I'm sorry about the late update, anything that is wrong either gramatically or spelling wise, and anything else that is wrong :) - All mistakes are my own and I claim them readily. Oh, and thanks for reading!


	9. Happy Christmas

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer**:

Read: What's yours?

Raekitty13: Nada, nada enchilada.

Reader: In English, Missy-Anne

Raekitty13: ABSOLUTELY NOTHING…sadly…

**Author's Notes:** Sorry this is sooo late. I claim all mistakes && nothing else.

**Thank yous**: just written && Isabella95 – sorry I didn't realize your reviews earlier! Please forgive me for this being so late! _ Hopefully this chapter doesn't disappoint you. Your support despite my lack of commitment is absolutely ASTOUNDING and I am the one who should be forever grateful for your kind words, not the other way around.

Thanks.

**Chapter Nine Happy Christmas**

Needless to say, Oliver made the Quidditch team. Regardless, the same routine was followed before every game. Call it a tradition. In all honesty, it probably became as much of a comfort for me as it did for him. It gave me something to fuss over—something other than being away from the only home I could remember that is.

As Christmas grew closer and the weather got colder I began to wonder what I would do for gifts. I had this new found talent and yet it couldn't help me in the slightest in the gift giving department. I used to just make gifts, never having much money back in the orphanage. But I felt like this year should be different. Not that I had any more money to work with but I had magic, and that should count for something, right?

It had to. I couldn't go home without my past AND no gifts.

I took to hanging out in the library in between classes and Quidditch games. Mostly to find a quiet place to do homework, but also so I could research simple gift making charms.

I've never been much of an artist, but colored pencil and crayon sketches were my signature gifts. I was flipping through another photo book when it hit me. The girls back home would LOVE LOVE LOVE a moving photo of me, Kelsey and my new friends.

All I had to do was find someone with a magical camera and convince them to take a picture or two for me –which was harder said than done.

"You don't have one either?" I asked Franki dejectedly, my last hope. Peter didn't have a need for one, Oliver's was at home and the Twins couldn't afford one.

"Lo siento, Chica," She murmured. "Wish I could be of help."

"It's okay," I told her with a weak smile. "I can just find another gift idea for the girls back home."

"Girls back home?" Franki asked, her soup spoon halfway between her mouth and her bowl. "You mean the muggle girls back in the orphanage?"

There was something in her tone that caught me off guard. It was harsher than I expected. I instantly felt myself tense, ready for a reprimanding, although I didn't quite understand why.

"Haven't you realized that muggles really can't be in on this stuff? People like you and Peter are lucky you can tell your families. Not that most would believe the kind of stories we brujos can rattle off, but the Wizarding world is supposed to be a secret, Querida," she stressed, voice more gentle, but just as urgent.

I glanced down at my toast for awhile before looking back up at her, knowing my eyes were as cold as ice, mere seconds from fusterated tears. "They are my family."

I thought she knew me better than that.

"I know," she said comfortingly. "But that's the kind of gift that would expose our world. They could show it to others and our magic would be known. It's dangerous, Cali."

I shook my head. "They wouldn't do that! They wouldn't show anybody! Besides, I read about a charm that makes the pictures look still in the presence or ill intending onlookers."

"Do you really think you could pull of a charm that complicated?" She wasn't trying to be mean, I knew that, but watching my perfect gift shatter before my eyes was weighing me down.

"I at least want to try," I informed her more forcefully than I had intended to.

Standing up quickly I left my breakfast untouched. I would find a wizarding camera. Mark my words.

"Cali?" Oliver demanded as I nearly ran him over and then ignored him completely. It wasn't intentional. I just have a one track mind.

I heard him ask Franki accusingly, "What did you do to her? She's walking around like-like…"

"A freaking zombie," George supplied before I was out of earshot.

I tromped back down to the library. Somewhere along the way Fred appeared at my elbow, keeping pace with me silently.

I loved that about him.

He never had to voice his support or demand that I spill my guts, he just stood there quietly. And his presence always worked wonders for me. He always managed to convince me to talk by simply being there in a noninvasive manner.

By the time we reached my library study carol and I threw my bag onto the floor. I was already ranting my disappointment at him in such a way that I didn't realize my preliminary boredom doodled notes had spilled out on the floor between our feet.

"I just wanted the perfect gift to take back with me! How can I not share the wonderful wizarding world with my FAMILY? That's what those girls are to me, Fred. Family. Why must I keep secrets from them?"

We had plunked ourselves down into our usual chairs, facing each other eye to eye. Except he wasn't looking me in the eye. Instead he was glancing down around our feet where my doodles lay sprawled and exposed.

"Is this what you usually give them?" Fred asked quietly, not answering my questions. Another trait I liked about him. If he didn't have a good enough answer, a real answer, a truthful one, he never gave one at all.

Some day I'm sure his evasiveness would kill me, but right now, as it always seemed to do when I was upset, it comforted me. I wasn't the only one without answers. I wasn't the only one who didn't understand.

I followed his gaze and nodded glumly at my horrid stick figure drawings, expecting him to start laughing at me. Admittedly they looked like a two year old had drawn them and if I'd been in a better mood I might have started laughing myself. The one I was currently looking at reminded me of an anorexic moose with two extra sets of legs and five antlers instead of two, although I knew it was supposed to be a picture of Yasmine laying on the dinner table the day we glued her hair into five jagged spikes. It was one of our favorite memoires because we were never given glue for an art project after that—and it had been my idea of course.

But Fred didn't laugh. He just picked it up, my anorexic moose with too many appendages and said: "Her arms were moving a bit weren't they? Kinda like this?"

And suddenly Stick Yasmine's arms were moving—exactly like I remembered them. Her head was so heavy once the glue dried that she thought she was going to fall off of the table. She had been flailing her arms like windmills.

And suddenly I was laughing.

"How'd you do that?" I demanded once I could breathe again.

Fred shrugged nonchalantly, hiding that adorable blush of his. "It's just a trick my brother Charlie showed me once."

"Just once?" I asked him.

He nodded, winking at me shyly. "I'm a quick study."

"Really?" Kelsey demanded, appearing out of nowhere, George and Lee Jordan trailing after her, all pulling up chairs of their own. "So why is it that you can't keep up in History of Magic?"

"Because Binns isn't nearly as talented as Charlie," Fred supplied. "I think you're about the only freak that stays awake through his monotone, Kelse."

"No," I corrected, pulled out of my funk entirely. "I'm pretty sure Lee stays up too, staring at Kelsey."

I got a round of laughs that nearly got us thrown out of the library. So much for getting homework done.

"So what were you two doing in here, all by yourselves?" Kelsey demanded in a way that made me feel guilty, like we were doing something wrong.

"Nothing," we replied in unison, making us sound like liars.

Were we?

"Uh-huh," Kelsey sing-songed.

"Oh come off it," Fred retorted. "We like each other about as much as George likes Angelina Johnson."

George made a gagging noise and I couldn't help but laugh. "She's not THAT bad."

"Bloody woman thinks she's gonna be better at Quidditch than me," George complained.

"George," I reminded him. "You're trying out for different positions, NEXT year."

"Doesn't matter," he stated bull headedly. "She looks at me funny, anyway."

"Because she can't tell you and Fred apart," Lee laughed. "You should see her trying to keep you both straight. She can't tell which one of you is talking to her half the time."

"And that's my problem, how?" George demanded. "She doesn't have to look at me like I have twelve extra arms."

"George," Fred commented gravely. "I hate to break it to you, mate, but you've got more than twelve extra appendages."

I watched, aching at the sides from holding in my laughter, as George leaped up from his seat and tackled Fred out of the chair beside me. "I'll show you. Twelve extra appendages."

They were wrestling on all of my notes for History of Magic when the librarian walked over to us and hissed, "Get out of here, now! You're much too noisy to be hanging out HERE."

I picked up my notes as the twins continued to roll around on the ground. Kelsey and Lee Jordan disappeared conveniently, leaving me to break the two apart.

"Come on," I tugged on either boy's arm. "Let's take this elsewhere."

"Whatever you say, Cali," one replied complacently.

"George, knock it off," the other complained. "You know you can't confuse her."

"I'm not trying to confuse her. And I'm not George. Honestly, can you get any more immature?"

"Seriously, George," I told him, shaking his arm roughly. "There's nothing between me and Fred."

George just glared at me. "I'm not George! I'm Fred. Don't you even know who I am?"

"Yes, I know who you are. You're the brother who thinks a girl is stealing his best friend," I remarked. "But you're getting angry at the wrong girl. Tell you what, we'll share Fred. He's been your best friend forever and I can't change that, but he can be my best friend too."

George shook his head. "That's not why I'm angry."

"You actually like Angelina?" I asked, reflecting on the tall black girl in our class. She had dark brown eyes and a keen smile. She wasn't one to be messed with, but she was friendly enough as far as I knew. She had been the one to argue with Professor McGonagall about letting first years try out for the Quidditch team.

"No," George sighed. "I'm not angry."

"Yes you are. You're upset about something," I told him, refusing to let it drop. I didn't know what it was about me, but the Weasley Twins couldn't lie to me—either of them—despite being able to deceit just about everybody else.

"I don't want to talk about it," he muttered. "Just something stupid…"

I reached for his hand and gave it a gentle squeeze before letting it go again. "Promise you'll tell me when you're ready to talk about it? I bet it's not nearly as stupid as you make it out to be."

We walked out of the library before Fred started grinning again. "He's upset 'cuz I tried to turn him into a squid once. He really did have twelve arms. And he thinks I have some sort of blabber mouth and tell the whole world about it."

I couldn't hide the smile that creeped across my face. "You turned him into a SQUID? Fred that's horrible!"

"Well I'm not actually all that great a magic, mind you."

"He did say TRIED, Cal," George added darkly, glaring at his twin.

Fred shrugged it off. "You should've seen what we did to Ronny-Kin's teddy bear."

"Now THAT was bloody brilliant," George admitted, grinning now himself, suddenly over having been turned into a squid. "You're not repulsed by the fact that I was half squid?"

"Not a chance," I smiled at him. "I am repulsed however that Fred is so cruel."

"Aw," Fred grumped. "It wasn't all that bad! You should've seen what he did to me first!"

"I told you!" George shouted. "That was totally PERCY!"

Fred shook his head. "Nu-uh. It was you, jerk face."

"What happened?" I asked, not sure I wanted to know.

"Don't ask," Fred quipped.

"Percy turned his chicken nuggets into—" George got cut off by Fred jumping onto his back.

"Shut you're ugly mug, Georgie!" He cried, as George tried to dump him off of his back.

"MY ugly mug? You were born first! So it's YOUR ugly mug!"

"Fred! George!" I cried, tugging on Fred's robes in an attempt to pull him off of George. "We're going to get into trouble again!"

"There's really nothing better to do before the train comes, right?" Fred demanded. "We're going home, Cal."

"Right," how could I have forgotten? We were going home for Christmas break. I was going to see my girls. I was going home.

So why did it feel like I was leaving it?

"Can you help me with something before we catch the train?" I asked Fred, pulling at his robe sleeve.

"Name it," he said with a smile.

"Stop getting all secretive on me, now," George added. "I want in."

"Can you help me finish animating my drawings?" I asked holding the remaining ones up. "They're going to be the best gifts ever."

"Absolutely," Fred told me.

"Under one condition," George suggested.

"Uh-oh…" His condition was that we had to sneak into Filch's office. There was something the two of them had seen the last time they were in there. And he had caught them looking at it. They couldn't be tied to its disappearance directly. They were going to filch something from Filch's office.

And they wanted my help.

"Come on, Cal," Fred pleaded.

"It's not his anyway," George added.

"It's been in there for ages."

"It was super dusty when we took it out of the drawer."

"He'll never even know it's gone."

"I won't help you with your gifts if you don't."

Back and forth they ping-ponged, one after the other until I agreed to help them. All I had to do was drop a dung bomb on the third floor and ditch to the train platform via a secret passage way they'd accidentally fell into the other night when they were wrestling over something else, get a train compartment and save them a seat. And cover for them if somebody asked where they were.

"Just tell them we slipped off to the loo, but we were just here a second ago."

"And that we'll be back in any second."

"You can do this, Cal," Fred added, messing up my hair with my hand. "Face it. You're our partner in crime."

George nodded a wicked gleam in his eyes. "Guilty by association. If we're gonna get caught, you might as well've done something fun in the process, right?"

It worked perfectly. My gifts were finished in no time. I easily dropped the dung bomb and slipped into the secret passageway. I met Oliver, Franki, Peter, Kelsey and Lee Jordan on the platform of the Hogwarts' Express and we easily snagged an open compartment.

Fred and George entered moments later looking pleased as punch, but neither said anything to me. Not even a wink. Guess they wanted to make sure I wouldn't be found guilty by association after all.

The train ride seemed so short once I realized it would be another two weeks before I saw any of them again.

Kelsey was coming back to the orphanage with me, but she would end up staying with her aunt. I had been offered the same arrangements, but I knew that I had to go home. I owed the girls an update. Owls just weren't good enough. Besides, just because I now had an interesting education didn't mean I was any different than they were.

I was the same old me—wasn't I?

"Here's our stop," Oliver informed us, pulling me up out of my seat by the hand gently. "Have a happy Christmas. I'll miss you all."

There were choruses of "Happy Christmas!" and "I'll miss you too!" all around as we left the train and walked onto the platform at King's Crossing. From there hugs were passed around along with promises to bring back good gifts and funny stories.

The Weasley family waved to me as they left and Kelsey's aunt came to pick us up.

Giving Oliver one last hug I turned and started my trek back home.

He grabbed my arm, however and pulled me back toward him. "Are you okay? You seemed pretty upset earlier."

I nodded at him. "I was scrambling for gift ideas. I didn't mean to walk right past you."

He smiled at me sweetly. "I know. So, I've been thinking about how not seeing you for two whole weeks is really gonna suck."

He wasn't looking at me any more, but rummaging around in his pocket, blushing profusely. "It's kinda early, but I want you to have this," he presented me with a shard of glass.

"I know it probably looks like junk," he rushed, "But it's actually part of a mirror. I've got the other half at home. We can use them to communicate over break, if you want."

I beamed at him, thowing my arms around his neck. "Thanks, Oliver. That's so sweet!"

He continued to blush. "Actually, it's kind of extreme, but you're not connected to the Floo network and..."

"Floo network?" I asked.

But before he could answer Kelsey called out to me, "Come on, Cali! We've got a cab waiting. Romeo'll still be in love with you when we come back from break!"

"Sorry," I muttered, blushing. "Gotta go."

"Have a Happy Christmas, Cali."

"You, too, Oliver. You, too," and I turned from him and ran to catch up to the waiting taxi cab.f


	10. Many Warm Welcomes

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer**: I think this would be an appropriate time to mention that A. I am NOT J.K. Rowling and B. I sincerely apologize for not posting in almost a year X_x

**Author's Notes:** Again, I am terribly sorry that this is so late. Who would've thought a Pre-Med degree would be so demanding? But I've missed writing dreadfully despite all the super-fabulous labs and reports and exams… As a forewarning, however, I feel so rusty at writing. If this chapter sounds more like a biology lab write up than a fictional story (with characters that are not my own) I apologize, but I promise to get back into the swing of things.

**Thank yous**: First and foremost a HUGE thank you goes out to those of you who have reviewed in the past. Next, but not by any means, secondly, here's a GINORMOUS thank you for all of you reading this now =] You guys rock.

**Chapter Ten-Many Warm Welcomes**

Kelsey and Mrs. Fewer dropped me off at the orphanage where I expected to see a large group of girls waiting for us, but nobody stood outside. It had to be the weather, I reasoned, as another cold wind swept through my hair.

As much as I had been looking forward to coming home I suddenly felt shy. With not a single soul standing outside, peering through windows or rushing out the door, I felt more like an outsider than I ever had before.

"Didn't you send them an owl about us coming?" Kelsey asked, sounding just as skeptical as I felt.

We were at the right orphanage, right? It's not like there could possibly be more than one dull gray brick building, repainted around the base with multicolored childish handprints from the youth of miserable, parentless girls. The round green bushes in front of the door way looked the same as ever and the name chiseled into the arched doorway, creating a flame-glazed, bold engraving of the name of my home, a name I would never forget, regardless of the décor. Saint Augustine's Home for Girls.

This was the place alright.

"Yes," I whispered, wondering if something had happened, something horrible.

"So where is everybody?" Kelsey demanded. "I know I wasn't here very long, but this seems rather unusual."

I nodded and she continued. "Did you want me to go in with you?"

I looked at her wide eyed, unsure of what to do.

"I was planning on saying hi anyway," Kelsey shrugged. "Don't want them to think I'm an arrogant State's girl or anything."

"Whatever your choice, dears, make it quickly. The taxi isn't going to wait forever," Mrs. Fewer pointed out. "And it's kind of hard to get one quickly around here."

I clutched my animated Christmas doodles to my chest and tugged on my trunk handle. It was now or never. And it really wasn't like I could walk away from here. This was my home, the only one I had ever known. And my family was inside. Maybe they just hadn't realized the time. They were all busy working on last minute gifts or dreadful homework, possibly even the headmistress's chores. As kind as she was, her chores always left us giving each other an earful afterwards.

"I'll go in alone and tell the girls you said Happy Christmas and the like," I said, smiling at Kelsey, my fear subsiding tenfold. "That way you don't lose your taxi. Happy Christmas! I'll deliver your gift by post!"

Kelsey still looked skeptical, "You sure, Cal? I'm more than willing to go in with you."

"We can always wait around for another taxi," Mrs. Fewer said, but I knew she was just saying so to be polite. They had a flight to catch. Kelsey and Mrs. Fewer were going to spend Christmas with Ted back in the States.

"I'll be fine. Besides, you don't want to be late for Mr. Fewer, now do you?" At her blush I couldn't help but smile. I knew that feeling.

"Happy Christmas, Cali," Mrs. Fewer said with a smile. Kelsey echoed her sediments and gave me one last hug.

"You'd better send me letter by owl as often as you send them to Oliver," she glared at me, but I couldn't help but laugh at her mock seriousness. "I'm being for real here, Cal," she pressed, now having to work harder to conceal her own laughter. If there was one thing I learned at Hogwarts, it was that my laughter was pretty contagious.

"I will," I promised. "Now get out of here already!"

As soon as I had waved them off, I bounded up the stairs and pulled on the double doors. The doors, however, did not open as they would have if the Headmistress had known I was coming. Caught a little off guard I shrugged it off and mentally suggested that they had forgotten the actual day I was coming home. Maybe they thought I wouldn't be in until tomorrow.

I pressed the little buzzer by the door and waited patiently for the door to be opened. After about two minutes I was beginning to wonder if the place had been shut down. I pulled away from the door slightly and peered through the window to my left. Lights were on and there appeared to be people moving about, not that I could really tell who, considering the windows were all beveled for privacy reasons.

When the door finally opened, the Headmistress looked down at me in surprise. "Cali? Whatever are you doing here, my dear? You didn't run away did you?"

"Run away?"

"I'll have to report you, you know. I can't have you coming back here. They'll be looking for you."

I was dumbfounded. "I haven't run away. School's out for Christmas. Didn't you get my letters?"

"Letters? What letters?" She seemed perplexed, but only for a moment. "Cali, you really shouldn't be here. If school is out on recess you should really be at home."

But I was at home. Wasn't I? What the heck was going on?

"Headmistress, could you invite whom ever happens to be on the doorstep in? It's frightfully cold outside," Jasmine asked from behind the Headmistress.

"Jasmine?" I called excitedly, trying to peer around the Headmistress. Maybe the girls just hadn't shared my letters with the Headmistress. A simple misunderstanding was all that was taking place right now.

"Cali?" Her tone didn't sound excited. It sounded surprised, but not welcoming at all.

Jasmine pushed her way forward, around the Headmistress and I could see all of the other girls converging into the hallway from multiple doors. They all wore the same cold, secluding scorn.

"What are you doing here?"

"What do you mean? I'm home for Christmas. I sent you all letters telling you that I was going to be here."

"Letters?" Haley gave a coarse, hallow laugh. "Is that what you've been telling yourself? That you've been sending letters to the dear 'sisters' left here in the orphanage? You could've actually sent one. Or told us that you had been adopted. I thought I was your best friend, Cali. You know, different from all the other 'chosen' girls. But I guess not. You're exactly the same. You get adopted and you ditch us, entirely.

"What's the matter, Cali? We're not good enough to fit into your 'new' family? We're too poor? What? Huh?"

She was shouting at me and it brought tears to my eyes. That wasn't the way it had been. I had written to them. Maybe not as much as I should have, but I had still done it. Oliver had witnessed it. I'd sent them with the morning post.

And then it hit me. It hit me so hard that the papers I had been clutching to me chest dropped to the floor, scattering everywhere in the wind. Franki's voice rang clearly in my head, "Haven't you realized that muggles really can't be in on this stuff? People like you and Peter are lucky you can tell your families. Not that most would believe the kind of stories we brujos can rattle off, but the Wizarding world is supposed to be a secret, Querida."

Somebody had been intercepting my post. Somebody had been stopping my letters and had never told me. If I would have known, I would have fixed what was said. I wouldn't have mentioned any magic. I would have simply written to them as if I wasn't a witch. I would've done whatever it took to keep them as friends, as family.

The other girls were yelling at me too, adding to the din, but I couldn't hear them, couldn't understand them either. All I could hear was Franki's reprimanding again and again. Why hadn't she told me earlier? Why hadn't anyone told me?

I should have known when I hadn't gotten a single response. It was so hard to think that something was going wrong at home while living a life of bliss at Hogwarts.

"I tried," I whispered in comparison to the roar in my head. "I tried. They must've stopped me."

"Who, Cali? You're new parents. Did they try to stop you? Don't feed us that kind of crap. Get out of here." Haley had said it, but I knew based on the facial expressions of the other girls, that they meant it too.

"You changed, Cali," Jasmine sneered at me. "As soon as that Kelsey girl came into the orphanage and started filling your head with stupid fantasies about magic and witchcraft. And then you decided to ditch us entirely. Hope your new sister's as good to you as you are to us."

And then she pushed me out of the doorway. I stumbled backwards down the stairs, landing in a drift of freshly sprinkled snow. I hadn't noticed it coming down silently in the background, and I wouldn't have noticed it now if it hadn't stung my hands like gravel. Everything felt like a knife cutting into me. Their jagged accusations, their sharp shoves and their devastating mistrust and dislike of me nearly killed me.

I pushed myself up from the ground and reached for the handle of my trunk blindly. Tears clouded my vision, but I ignored them, trying so hard to quite the roaring tide of emotions and angry voices resounding inside my head. Finding the handle I gripped it tightly, turned and ran. I ran as far as I could, up the hill behind the orphanage to my favorite hiding place, the old willow tree on the far side of the hill. There I collapsed against the trunk and folded in upon myself, sobbing uncontrollably.

I don't know when I noticed the warming sensation in my pocket. It was probably around the time when I ran out of tears to cry. Or maybe when I had grown so cold that even my runny nose had solidified, either way, all I knew was that it was freezing, I was freezing and then suddenly there was warmth. I dug my hand numbly into my pocket where the warmth was radiating from and realized that there was a soft voice whispering my name over and over again, urgently.

My hand wrapped around something sharp and flat. Pulling it from my pocket I realized that it wasn't only radiating heat, but light as well. After my eyes adjusted to the sudden brightness in the growing darkness I recognized the small shard of glass Oliver had given me just before I left King's Cross Station. It was the two way mirror and in the very center of it was an all too familiar, anxious face. One I wanted to see now more than anything. It was the face that symbolized my ticket to my past and hopefully my future.

"Cali? Cali, what's wrong?" His voice was music to my ears, instantly calming the raging storm that had been brewing in my head.

The Wizarding World was real and I was a part of it. Furthermore, I might not have a family at the orphanage, but I wasn't alone.

"Oliver," I croaked, realizing for the first time how sore my throat was. Taking a deep breath I told him what had happened. "How did you know I needed you?"

"I'll explain that later, where are you?"

"Behind the St. Augustine Home for Girls. Why?" I asked, still wondering how he knew I needed a friend.

"That's the one out in West County, right? And your favorite place is below the willow tree you doodle on your potions homework?"

I stopped pondering his magical ability to know when I was emotionally unbalanced and just stared at the mirror. "You saw that?"

"Cali! Focus for me and answer the bloody question!"

But I couldn't focus. If he'd seen my tree doodles then he had probably seen my random Mr. and Mrs. Oliver Wood scribbles too…

"Cali!"

"Yes, I'm under the willow tree," the same one I drew standing over our future wedding ceremony. Silly, I know, but come on, every girl's got her crush! And at eleven you really do think that's all there is to life. Finding that one really cute boy and then getting married to him. Living happily ever after. I mean, that's what you believe in once you get over that whole, boys have cooties thing. And with Oliver, believe me. You'd drop that "boys have cooties" thing in a heartbeat. As a matter of fact you'd start contemplating whether or not cooties are actually all that bad…

"I'll be there in five minutes, Cal. Hey Mum!" and then he was gone.

"Wait! Wait! Five minutes?" My sudden confusion pulled me out of my blushed phase quickly. How the bloody saints of Augustine and frogs alike was he going to get here in five minutes from Scotland?

"Cali! Cali, dear, where are you?" The strict voice of Professor McGonagall wafted toward me from the far side of the hill, but I would have swore it wasn't her due to the fact that all the strictness was gone and in its place was nothing but concern and a bit of well masked panic. "Cali!"

And then she rounded the top of the hill. I almost didn't recognize her either to be honest. She was dressed in jeans and a sweater underneath a knee length green trench coat.

"There you are!" She proclaimed when she laid eyes on me, relief brightening her well worn face. "I've been searching everywhere for you! I couldn't find you at the school, or King's Crossing. And then I got a call from your orphanage mistress. Cali, are you alright?"

"Why were you looking for me at school and King's Crossing? And why on earth did the Headmistress of Saint Augustine's call you?" I demanded more harshly than I should have. But to be fair she totally took me by surprise.

"Now, Cali," She said in a soft reprimanding voice, one I was surprised she possessed. "There have been a few miscommunications between the two of us and if you calm yourself we can discuss them back at home."

"Back home?" I cried desperately. "This is my home! Or at least it was…"

"Cali?" Oliver was suddenly standing by my side, an old shoe in his hand. Two grown adults, one a pretty woman with dark brown hair and blue eyes like the sky and the other a tall man with Oliver's sandy hair were each holding on to the shoe as well.

"In order for you to attend Hogwarts, the Orphanage Mistress of Saint Augustine's required that you be adopted, Cali," McGonagall continued despite her added audience. "So I signed the forms. I tried to tell you on several occasions, but you were never to be found, especially today."

I thought back about storming off to the library before lunch was over, getting kicked out of the library, planting the stink bomb and using the secret passageway onto the train and then receiving Oliver's Christmas present and diving into the taxi. I probably was pretty hard to find today.

"Why didn't you try to tell her sooner?" Oliver asked, voice as angry as I felt. "You shouldn't've procrastinated!"

"Oliver," His mother's voice was chiding, but quite, reminding him to respect Professor McGonagall. Her hand, I noticed, when I turned to face him, was on his arm. He shrugged her off, however, and came to stand directly behind me, his long lanky arm protectively slung around my slender waist.

"The paper work wasn't finalized until today and Professor Dumbledore and I were unsure as to whether or not Cali would be allowed to visit her childhood home. If a visit was possible we wanted her to make her proper goodbyes. Judging by you emotional state, dear, it appears as if nothing has gone right today," she was talking to me, I could tell immediately because her tone changed from one of indignation to one of concern.

I shook my head and felt the dark, dreary tentacles of hopelessness and heartbreak creep upon me from the very shadows of my shattered heart. I couldn't even voice a simple "no" without my voice getting caught in my throat. The sound resembled a warbled, mutilated whimper foreign even to my own ears. Oliver's arm tightened around my waist.

Final I muttered, "What am I going to do?"

"You can come home with us," He turned his head to look back at his parents, "Right, Mum? Dad?"

They nodded quietly in the back ground and I swiveled my head back in the direction of McGonagall.

She seemed to notice the way Oliver was standing. Her eyebrows arched slightly and she inclined her head towards us. "I was planning on taking you back to my house so you could get used to the arrangements, but I can see that you are in need of a bit of a pick me up that only a close friend can manage. I can't have you stay with them all break, you'd be overstaying your welcome-"

"Hardly," Oliver scoffed.

McGonagall continued, "And you really should get used to your new living space at my house before summer rolls around. If the Woods don't mind, I'll let you stay until Christmas evening."

Again, the Woods nodded behind me as my head swiveled between all of them.

My heart was starting to swell again, unthaw slightly. Don't get me wrong, it was severely damaged, possibly beyond repair from my welcoming home part, but I didn't feel quite so alone. I had a place to go. Two places actually. And I was wanted, maybe even loved. That kind of realization can't go unnoticed by the heart for too long without some sort of response.

I wanted to cry all over again, this time out of sheer relief and happiness.

"Is that alright with you, Cali?" McGonagall was still watching me like a hawk. I must've looked quite the mess.

I nodded, afraid to talk for fear of making a wretched noise like I had only moments ago.

She nodded in response and added, "I'll be along to pick you up then shortly after Christmas dinner."

When she turned and vanished into thin air only moments later, Oliver slipped his other arm around me and pulled me toward himself. He held me there tightly, in the hollow of his chest, gently stroking my hair. I hadn't realized I was crying again until I heard him hush me gently, whispering how it was all going to be alright.

"There, there, dear," His mother cooed, coming up behind us both, draping a warm blanket over my shoulders.

Someone, I'm guessing his father, pried the handle of my trunk from my stone cold fingers and awkwardly patted my hand as Oliver continued to hug me. Once my hand was free of my luggage it was like they were suddenly unparalyzed and were moving of their own free will. I reached my arms around him and pulled him closer, squeezing my eyes closed, hoping to hold back most of the next onslaught of tears.

"Now, Oliver," I barely heard his mother whisper, "Don't let her go. I'm going to activate the portkey," before the world beneath my feet began to spin.

I clutched myself to Oliver even tighter, too far lost in my own misery to realize that I was no longer standing outside in the cold.


	11. HeWhoMustNotBeNamed

**The Girl Everybody Forgot**

By Raekitty13

**Disclaimer**: It's the same old same old here!

**Author's Notes:** If you've read this far you don't want any more lame author's notes! On with the Fan Fic!

**Thank yous**: Julie662, thanks for your review!

**Chapter Eleven: He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named**

After about three cups of hot chocolate and a handful of Christmas cookies I was finally consolable. The warmth of the house and the warmth of the Wood family had me convinced that I had a place in the world after all. We played games, we talked a lot. We even watched movies. Basically it was all of us curled up on the couch together, acting like a family orphans could only dream of.

I still couldn't wrap my head around the fact that I had been adopted. By McGonagall. It was just too weird for me. Laying on the couch surrounded by blankets and the quite murmur of the fire I contemplated the latest turn of events in my life once more. Oliver was laying on the floor beside the couch, snoring softly.

When I couldn't figure out exactly what it meant to have a mother of my own, finally, I succumbed to simply watching my gorgeous guardian angel sleep. How had he known that I was so utterly heartbroken? How had he known that I needed him more than anything? Why was it so fascinating to watch the flames flicker across his sleeping facial features? He was so captivating, so calming. His image finally lulled me to sleep.

"_Meow?" I asked confused by the sound of my voice. I looked up at my mother, her long red hair fanned out about her face, stomach bulging. She looked concerned, like there was something wrong. _

"_James, I don't know if this is such a good idea," She whispered to my father. He was standing there, tall and skinny, running his hands through his jet black hair._

"_Meow?" I crawled over to my mother's feet and raised my hand to tug on her pants' leg, but found I could not grasp anything. Upon further examination, my hand was fuzzy. Now, I wasn't all that familiar with my hands, but I'm pretty sure they were never covered in so much ginger fur before. "Meow! Meow! Meow!"_

_I couldn't help but cry. What was wrong with me? And why was there a kitty mocking my cries? Stealing my parent's attention?_

"_She'll be alright, Lily," Daddy replied, bending down to pick me up. He stroked the top of my head gently, lovingly and I felt a little better. "That's a good girl, Lori. Don't cry. Being a kitty isn't so bad, now is it?"_

"_Meow?" What was Daddy talking about?_

"_It's just like playing pretend," He continued. "Kitties have whiskers," he ruffled the long hairs protruding from my face, tickling me. I laughed and it sounded like a deep purr. "and long beautiful fur," he stroked my head again, right between my ears and I purred again. "and tails!"_

_I looked down at the part of my body I couldn't identify. Tail. I didn't have a tail._

"_James," Mummy said gently, still worried. "This just doesn't feel right."_

"_You heard the prophecy, Lily," Daddy whispered back, no longer looking at me. "Isn't it bad enough that one of our children will constantly be in danger? If no one knows about Lori, she'll be safe. Voldemort will never come after her."_

_Mummy was crying, holding onto her tummy like there was something precious inside. "Can't we save them both?"_

"_We'll do everything possible, Love," Daddy murmured, cradling her in his free arm, the one that had been pointing out all of my kitty parts. "Besides, who can get through me?"_

_Mummy smiled weakly at him. "Are you sure this is the best way to save her?"_

_Daddy didn't say anything._

"_It seems so unfair to her," Mummy whispered. "If something happens to us, who will care for her?"_

"_Nothing will happen to us," Daddy whispered back. "We'll take care of Lori and Harry. You'll see. We'll be okay, Lily."_

"_Meow!" I agreed, not really understanding what was going on, simply loving the sound of their soothing voices. I wanted them to talk forever, to hold me forever. But Mummy was sad. I liked it better when she smiled._

_I squirmed a bunch in Daddy's arms and he gently put me down. I looked up at Mummy. I could play pretend that I was a kitty if it would make her happy. It wasn't really that bad. I could bat at shoe laces like Ziggy, the neighborhood stray we sometimes played with. I could chase my tail and purr more. _

_Mummy smiled at me. "Do you like being a kitty, Lori?"_

"_Meow!" I responded, rubbing up against her leg lovingly. _

_She bent down and picked me up, carrying me to the couch. Daddy followed and we sat on the couch together, "Mummy's sorry baby," she wrapped her arms around me lovingly and her warmth instantly made me sleepy._

I awoke, still embraced in my mother's loving arms. It was so cozy that I almost didn't want to move, didn't want to open my eyes. Didn't want to wake up at all.

"Cali?" Oliver's sweet voice coaxed me from my half dreaming state. If I had to abandon my fantasies about my parents, the best reality to wake up to would be one with Oliver touching my elbow gently. "Cali why are you making cat noises?"

"Cat noises?" I asked him, rolling over and taking in the living room setting. Morning light was steaming in through the closed blinds. Oliver looked quizzical, but not too worried.

"You were meowing," He elaborated. "You know, Meow!"

I laughed at him. "You're just joshing me!"

"Am not!" Oliver responded with a pout. It was so adorable that it stole the breath right out of me.

"I had a weird dream," I admitted, realizing for the first time that I could remember what had happened. "I dreamt that my parents, whoever they were, had changed me into a cat to save me from something."

Oliver raised his eyebrows in questioning. "That's quite odd. I thought you couldn't remember your parents."

"I can't," I told him sheepishly. "For all I know it was completely random."

I suddenly felt bummed. Was it possible that all of my dreams were as farfetched as my last one? All my night terrors that I could never remember, were they all just fabrications pieced together from odds and ends instead of actual memories of my past? Who was I other than the girl with no past?

Oliver seemed to sense my mood and rubbed my arm. "I've had weirder dreams," he assured me. "And I'm sure there are plenty of people who have been transfigured into cats in the Wizarding World. I mean look at what we did to those poor rats!"

I laughed, remembering that we had turned them into goblets.

"And we already assumed that your parents were wizards, right? That's why Blaze told you to take the letters from Hogwarts seriously?"

And then we just gawked at each other. Blaze, the cat, had told me to take letters from Hogwarts seriously. I could talk to cats. I could understand their language when others couldn't. Had I just figured out why I could speak Cat?

"Cali," the same question was upon Oliver's lips, I could see it. But before he could ask it, his mother walked down the stairs and smiled at us.

"Good morning, children."

"'Morning Mum," Oliver replied, smiling. "It's always a good sign when my mum's up."

"Why's that?" I asked, Cat Tongue conversation momentarily derailed.

"Because it means we're going to be fed soon." We couldn't help but laugh.

"What's so funny?" Mr. Wood asked; his hair in worse bed-head condition than Oliver's ever seemed. "It's not my hair, is it?"

We just continued to laugh. "You look lovely, dear," Mrs. Wood told him, already starting breakfast. "Who's up for a trip to Diagon Alley later today?"

Let's just say that traveling by floo powder takes some getting used to. I'm also pretty certain that this is how Santa Clause gets around, what with all those chimneys he goes down and what not. I explained this to Oliver and he readily agreed.

"How else would he get around the world in one night?" He further supplied.

With one mystery down we decided to touch base on the more urgent one as soon as we were wandering around Diagon Alley by ourselves. Mr. and Mrs. Wood had given us a bit of pocket change to buy a few last minute gifts and had left us to our own devices.

"I think your dream was a memory," Oliver informed me. "I think your parents really turned you into a cat when you were little. It makes so much sense as to why you can speak to cats."

We were whispering to avoid creating suspicion. We might be wizards among our own kin, but as Oliver so kindly pointed out to me that having special powers beyond what the normal wizard has isn't anything you really want to announce to the world. Especially when that special ability has to do with speaking an animal language.

"Why not? I guess I was under the impression that it was just a part of my magical tendencies."

"Oh, it is," Oliver assured me, "Or at least because someone else transfigured you at such a young age that you were able to learn the language fluently. The problem with it is—well I'll explain it in full later, but there was a certain wizard who could talk to certain creatures. He was so terrifying and horrible that even today people dare not speak his name."

I just looked at him skeptically. I couldn't help it. His explanation was so vague it just sounded… like an excuse.

"Don't worry," he added. "I'll fill you in on all the details later. I promise."

"I'm going to hold you to that!" I told him.

He just grinned. We bought a few little trinkets. He got his mum Christmasy kitchen towel sets, his dad a weird looking tool kit. He said it helped with Garden Gnomes… whatever those happen to be… and I bought Kelsey the Encyclopedia of House Hold Chores spells. It was on sale for a good price.

Once we were back at home (the return trip didn't change my mind about liking muggle transportation better that Wizarding transportation) and everybody had settled down for the night Oliver told me the story of the all powerful wizard—He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

"Poor baby Harry," I said, feeling a battered pang of kinship for the little guy. His parents were taken from him at such a young age. And the story even said he had no idea who he was in the Wizarding world, having been raised by Muggles—just like me.

Unlike me, however, Harry's whole life was documented. He would have no problem discovering who his parents were. I wondered if he had nightmares too, of the night his parents died.

"Yeah," Oliver agreed. "It was horrible."

"Do you suppose it'll all go to his head?"

"Hmm?" Oliver asked confused. "What do you mean by 'it'll all go to his head?'"

"He stopped He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. He brought about a revolutionary era where people could live free of fear. Do you think his childhood fame will go to his head?"

"I doubt it," Oliver stated. "I mean he wasn't raised by his parents, but I heard both Lily and James Potter were good people. I can't image Harry being horrible."

Lily and James Potter. Harry Potter. The names struck me as familiar all of a sudden.

"What's up, Cal?" Oliver caught my pensiveness almost immediately.

"Dunno," I replied. "But their names sound so familiar. Like I've heard them all before."

"Probably at school," Oliver said with a shrug. "They are pretty famous after all."

I nodded. He was probably right. I just couldn't shake the feeling that I was missing something, something important about their lives.

"So why don't people say his name?"

"Whose name?"

"He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named."

"Because they say he shows up to kill you the instant his name leaves your lips," his voice was low, like he was trying to tell a scary story.

"But I thought Baby Harry finished him off," I responded, knowing that I, of all people, shouldn't be the one questioning a superstition or fear.

"There are a few who believe he's still out there. Or that saying his name will bring back his ghost to haunt you."

"Like saying Bloody Mary three times and spinning in circles in a dark room?" I asked, suddenly intrigued. I was terrified of the dark, but the only one of the girls in the orphanage to do it. I had them turn the lights off after I had closed my eyes. Then I had spun around as fast as I could saying her name. Never once did I open my eyes and look in that mirror. I knew it wasn't going to be Bloody Mary or Cali I saw, but the lingering, all consuming darkness just waiting to suck my soul from my very being.

"Sort of…" Oliver didn't like my sudden interest in the topic.

"What's his name?" I demanded straight away. "Tell me, Oliver or… Or I'll tickle you!"

"I'm not ticklish," he said shortly, which we both knew was a lie. He just pretended—really well on most occasions mind you—that he wasn't ticklish. But I knew his ticklish spot and he knew it.

"Name, Oliver."

"How about I write it down?"

"What a Gryffindor boy is afraid to speak the name of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named? Say it isn't so!" I was teasing him. Probably shouldn't have been after how kind he was to me, but the whole ordeal seemed silly to me.

"I'll turn off the lights and see which one of us Gryffindors is a scardy cat," Oliver countered.

I sucked in my breath. It was a low blow, but true. "Turn off the lights," I told him after a moment of hesitation.

"What?" He looked around the room, noted the blinds were drawn and that the fire place only had burning embers left. "Are you serious?"

I had to do this. I could feel it calling my name. The curiosity was astounding. I couldn't let it go. It only seemed right to have the name of the man who murdered Harry's parents spoken out loud and if I had to suffer a few minutes in the dark to achieve that justice, so be it.

I nodded at him, "But you have to hold my hand," I added quickly, before I forgot to mention it. The last time I was left stranded in the dark Fred was my only anchor to reality and he had a firm grip on my hand. Had he not I would probably still be lost even to this very day. Not that I told Oliver that, though. I was more content with him thinking that I just wanted an excuse to hold his hand rather than have him think that I was a chicken.

He nodded, "If you're sure," but he was already standing up, propelled by the idea of getting to hold my hand, I hoped to myself.

I watched him walk to the light switch, flick it and then I only saw his outline walking back toward me in the ever growing darkness. I could feel my chest tightening and my nerves slipping—and then his warm, solid hand slipped into mine and the knowledge of his presence chased the icy tentacles of fear away.

"Are you okay?"

"Yes."

"Are you sure you want me to say his name?"

"Yes."

"We could DIE."

"OLIVER, Say his name!"

There was a brief pause where all I could hear was our alternating breaths. The suspense was beginning to kill me more than anything. I thought he wasn't going to reply.

"_Voldemort," _And suddenly I could remember the nightmare.


End file.
